Call to Arms
by katherine-with-a-k
Summary: Rilla of Ingleside retold from the point of view of Ken, Rilla's brothers and sisters, the Merediths, and the Fords. Find out why Ken fell for Rilla, whether Jem and Faith were really engaged, what Jerry truly thought of Nan, why Walter and Di grew apart, how war affected Anne and Gilbert, and other secrets Rilla never knew about. PART TWO BEGUN...
1. Kenneth Ford gets his Come-uppance

**CALL TO ARMS  
><strong>

_~with thanks to Go Dons for the Rilla-Ken idea, and AlinyaAlethia for the goods on the grown up kids of Glen St Mary_

_~and as always, with love and gratitude to L.M. Montgomery -everything is hers, only this idea is mine_

**_K+_**

_**Kenneth Ford gets his Come-Uppance**_

_In which we are introduced to Anne and Gilbert's eldest children; Jem, Walter, twins Nan and Di_, _their best friends_, _Jerry and Faith_ _Meredith, and_ _Kenneth Ford._ _But first, as it must and always shall be, it begins with Susan Baker..._

**Ingleside, Glen St Mary, July 1914**

Susan Baker heard them before she saw them, the sounds of 'Onward Christian Soldiers' being sung in tones hardly meant for church. Not that they had come from one, but from another of those gadabout picnics they were all so fond of. Why they insisted on lugging their luncheon all over the Glen when there was a perfectly good table for them to sit at! But then one could not grow up under the loving hand of Anne Blythe without acquiring some of her more peculiar traits. Not that Susan would admit that anything Mrs Dr dear did could ever be brought into question. Why, she would rather be cursed with such swollen, hot hands as could _never_ make pastry again than say one word against that angel. Yet she might also wish those rowdy youths coming up the shallow slope to Ingleside might not make such an exhibition of themselves. The way they sang, "We are not divided, all one body we!" sounded, to her ears at least, faintly scandalous.

"Su-san! Su-san!" one of them called now. That would be Jem, who had a tone of voice that was all his father's, filled with unexpressed laughter as though waiting on everyone to finally get the joke.

Much less innocent exclamations followed, as someone -either Jem or Jerry, you could be sure of that- caused an upset in the hallway. Next came the sounds of a sword fight, ah, it was those umbrellas again. If they would only slot them into the stand as she told them they would not always be knocked about by their great big feet. Susan rolled the pastry into a nice long sausage trying to recall what size feet the young men had in _her _day_, _as young Rilla Blythe would put it. Surely they were not so big as the ones they all had now. But then that was progress for you.

Having vanquished his foe a tall, auburn haired lad made his way to the most sacred place at Ingleside, that was Susan Baker's kitchen.

"Slaving away in the dark again," Jem said, strolling up to the scrubbed pine table. "Why don't you listen to ol' Dads and let him have an electric light installed?" He dunked a brown finger into a bowl of cherry pie filling and was batted away like a fly.

"Off with you, James Blythe," Susan snipped. "You alone know where those mitts have been and even then I wouldn't take your word for it!" The boy sucked on his thumb, cheekily, and went to the pantry. "'Sides, it is _not_ dark in here," she called after him, "it's only that you've come from the bright outside. We have no need of these switches and wires in here, thank you very much. Mrs Forbes from Upper Glen gave all her lamps away when they had the _electrickery_ installed, and what happened in the first big storm? Silly woman didn't have a match to light the fire with."

Susan might have continued and would have enjoyed it, had not the clinks and clatters coming from her stores begun to distract her. What _was_ he doing in there?

"And I don't see how you can all be so hungry still," she said to Jem as he reappeared a moment later with a tray of sugary, flaky, buttery treats. Perhaps, she surmised as he winked one hazel eye at her, such excessive appetites showed on some men not by the number of holes in their belts but by the size of their boots. "Why, I'm positive when I gave you those hampers this morning you described it yourself as Baker-nalian." It had been Walter's little quip, and they had left the dear duck to assume he had been referring to Susan's cooking abilities rather than the god of wine, women and song. "So, I don't know why you'd be wanting another dozen puffs on top when I sent you out with _two_ pies."

"Yes, well..." Jem began, trying to squeeze a jar of gooseberry preserves onto his pile, "there was a bit of bad luck with the peach one. You know your pies might sit up as soft and light as pillows, Susan, but they are definitely _not_ for sitting on. That's why you find us back so soon, poor sis needed clean duds."

Susan deftly swapped the gooseberry preserves for plum, for heaven knew there were enough plums this year to have all manner of girls falling into them. But the gooseberry, _that_ was for the Doctor.

Poor Di, she found herself thinking, ever the gooseberry in the little quartet of Jem and Faith, Nan and Jerry. Thank goodness she and her brother, Walter, were so close. If only she'd take a liking to someone else's brother, that Carl Meredith say. Though naturally Di would feel the age difference more keenly at nineteen than Susan would at sixty, where a gent of fifty-eight would certainly be appreciated. She picked up her tray of pastry and went to the cool store, the very image of a pigeon nodding her head and cooing, Poor poor Di... poor poor Di...

"How on earth did you know it was Di who needed a change of kit?" Jem asked, pressing his chin onto his pile to steady it.

"Because I never heard her go up the stairs, you see."

"No, I don't see," Jem said. But clearly Susan Baker did, all too well -he would have to be extra careful when he snuck out on his moonlit trysts with Faith.

"Nan's in those_ heels_ all the time, isn't she. You never have to look up to know when Nan's come into the room, whereas Di wears slippers."

Jem made a mental note to recommend Nan give up those silly shoes if she planned to take any strolls of her own. "Well, you needn't pity Di for all that. She caught _two_ trout, you know, she's washing them now at the pump. Ken's the one I feel for. Di's been teasing him something savage for never landing one. Says he's gone soft from all that city living."

As well he would, Susan thought, with that same sense of rightness someone else might have felt on being taught that one and one equal two. Famous author or no, it was inexcusable of Owen Ford to whisk their Leslie off to Toronto -what a place to raise children! That son of theirs was certainly no Island boy. "I for one will never be sorry to hear when Kenneth Ford gets his come-uppance. With him forever swanning about with that look upon his face, as though he just talked his way out of a spanking and was rather pleased about it."

Jem wondered who might not be pleased at such an outcome. Possibly the Rome-ish sort -though if he chanced such an opinion in Susan's holy realm she was likely to snatch the tray from his hands and spank _him_.

"What say, Blythe," said the man himself, his dark, tousled head poking through the kitchen door. "You baking the eats, what's the hold up?"

"Take that," Jem replied, shoving the tray into Ken's arms. "If you act as donkey saves me the trouble of coming back for the drinks."

"Not surprised it took you so long," Ken said, his dark grey eyes lighting up at the sight of all that booty. "You have to feel your way like a blind man in here. There's such a thing as light-bulbs now, you know? I suppose you Island lot are waiting until you can plug in a potato," and he chuckled in that velvety way which made most people -that is, most _female_ people- want to laugh along with him.

They were in scant supply in this kitchen, however. Jem just rolled his eyes, mulling over the best angle to chip at the block of ice before him and felled such a slab of the stuff it shattered all over the floor. The icepick was plucked swiftly from his grasp.

"That is it. Out, out, both of you, _out!_" Susan hollered, as Jem and Ken lurched backward into a cherrywood dresser. "If I _dare_ see either of you in here again today it won't just be the ice that gets it."

They scooted out to the veranda steps but not before Jem had bravely scooped up bottles of lemonade and elderflower to take with him. And if the girls wanted it cold they could prize the icepick out of Susan Baker's hands themselves.

**… … …**

"That is _it_ for me," Nan said, wiping the last crumb from her lips, "We'll be called in for the next meal in a moment and then I really _will_ explode."

She lay back against her sister's leg and nestled into the grassy slope that ran beyond the veranda of Ingleside. They had intended to make their way back to Rainbow Valley. But who could take another step with the lawn so soft and cool, and minty little zephyrs bobbing among the swollen heads of roses and peonies.

"Just make it a pick up supper then, sister dear." Jem yawned. Faith really had bested him in that tennis match, perhaps he _was_ spending too much time with his head in a book. He peered around to see if Susan was lurking nearby and then following Nan's example nestled his head upon Faith's lap.

"Me?" Nan said, "and why should _I _do it I'd like to know."

"Because, you ninny, _I_ made the afternoon tea."

Faith gave Jem a playful swipe, but there was another girl in their company who felt more should be done than that. She may have shared Jem's hair colour but she definitely did _not_ share his sentiment.

"_Made_ it?" Di scoffed, tucking a red curl behind her ear with an impatient hand. "Raided Susan's pantry is what you did! Do you think all those plum preserves and apricots tarts just appear by themselves, who do you think made them?"

Her green eyes sparked dangerously. Jem Blythe had been notably absent when the women of Ingleside had toiled in the kitchen over scalding pots of fruit this year -and _every_ year come to that.

"Don't mention tarts," Nan wailed, "I _always_ do this when we come back home, and I always return to school in the fall vowing _never_ again. Oh, but Susan bakes like an angel."

An avenging angel, Jem thought to himself, taking a swig of warm lemonade. He plumped his head upon Faith's thighs and gave Di a wink.

Di clicked her tongue at him, deciding what her brother needed was some good old fashioned ignoring. She brought her attention to the greedy goose in her own lap and began weaving a braid through her glossy brown hair. "You should have observed my foresight, sister dear-"

"And landed in a pie whilst trying to land a fish?"

"No," Di said, tugging a length with more vigour than necessary, "put on a nice, comfy dress."

Nan eyed her sister's faded print. Honestly, Di, could she not even make the tiniest effort? Blousey old dresses were all very well on an 'any ol' day' sort of day. But _not_ for a silken Saturday afternoon, with that dish of a Kenneth Ford to boot! There was not a hint of the annoying 'big brother' about him now. If Nan could have stopped comparing every young man she met with a certain minister's son she might have turned her head at him, herself. Strange to say she could not, in which case it fell to Nan to look out for her twin. Though Di might help herself.

She could just see Di was going to go in for all those thoroughly shapeless things that Ken's sister, Persis, assured her were becoming 'all the rage'_. _Such a funny phrase, it sounded almost like swearing -she might let someone else say it in front of Father first. These new silhouettes were decidedly dowdy. How much nicer it was to be tucked up tight in a satiny corselet and laced up like a present. Though Nan did regret getting little Rilla to pull quite so tightly this morning, she really was fit to burst.

"It suits you, Di," said Walter. "A girl with brilliant hair should leave her garb plain. Think of the pre-Raphaelites-"

"Not the pre-Raphaelites _again_, Walter. Scoundrels and wastrels all of 'em."

"Do stop professing opinions that aren't your own," Faith said to the lad in her lap.

"Think of the pre-Raphaelites," Walter repeated, raising his voice over Faith's resulting squeal. "All those divine women," -here he resolutely did _not_ look upon the woman who best fitted that description- "dressed in nothing but smocks-"

"Hah, smocks! Well _you_ said it Walter, _I_ didn't."

Nan this time. Not that it fazed Walter in the slightest, the Ingleside clan were well used to talking over, around and through each other. It was only others who had a time keeping up.

"No one _is_ looking at their smocks," Walter said. A little pointedly too, Nan thought -showing off for Faith again, no doubt. "But at their radiant beauty. Remember Di, what your own namesake told us? That Marilla would put Mother in the meanest little things and they only seemed to make her look more lovely."

"Since when did you care for the feminine mode?" Faith asked him, cutting Jem off mid argument by holding her hand over his mouth, and pulling away as he licked her palm. "I'm trying to listen to your brother!" she scolded, wiping her hand on Jem's shirt and staring at Walter determinedly.

"Well I _don't_, particularly-" said Walter, forgetting his point now her amber eyes were upon him.

"Exactly!" Jem declared. "There Faith, he was actually saying the opposite, weren't you Walt? Trouble with _you _Miss Meredith is you _don't_ listen."

"Oh, really? Well get an earful of this!" Faith wet her finger and plunged it into one of Jem's famously perfect ears.

"Ken-neth, Jer-ry!" Jem called out to the green behind the rose hedge, which this summer had been grandly designated 'the tennis court'. "Put those bally rackets down and lend some aid to us poor fellows. These women are being impossible!" He burst with laughter as Faith's tickly hands pretended to choke him.

Two young men appeared through the blooms, one limping, the other bounding to the vacant spot next to a certain brown eyed girl. He tucked up smartly beside Nan and gave her a lop sided grin.

"I don't know if the rules for tennis differ in the big city, Kenneth," Jerry said, "but you looked as though you were playing badminton."

"I was leading two games to one as I recall," Ken replied, as he lowered himself onto the slope. His foot began to throb and he wrangled with an empty basket to rest it upon.

"Whatever are you doing larking about like that, Ken?" Nan asked him, "You're supposed to be-"

"If you so much as mention this accursed ankle, Nan Blythe, the next pie I find will have your face all over it."

"Try it Ford, and your other ankle will be next," There was a hint of humour in the midst of Jerry's quick, black eyes. But the merest of hints for all that.

"You really mustn't," Di said, giving Ken a wink, "Nan couldn't eat another thing, could you, darling?"

Nan huffed with half hearted indignation, "Alright, I _would_ like to change into something more comfortable". There was the oddest dress that Persis had sent her via her big brother, Ken, that she might put on for dinner. She would have to tell Rilla she wanted back on their swap -though Rilla's little cap _was_ adorable...

Walter pulled himself up in one swift movement and twitted Di's pretty nose, "What did I tell you My-Di. You are dressed to prosey perfection!"

Di smiled down at him affectionately as he lay back once more, noticing how inky his hair looked, how pale his skin, against the vivid green of the grass. No one who did not know them might have guessed they were ever related.

"Prosey perfection... that reminds me," Ken said, pouring himself a drink, "don't suppose you provincial types caught wind of that scandal in Russia?"

"Russia, Prussia, bullrusher!" Nan exclaimed. "That's all you mainlanders talk about I suppose. On the Island we hardly need to talk at all, we just... listen... to the trees and the wind and the sea..."

Ken stifled a snort. The Blythes listen? Did any family talk _more_ he'd like to know. "In that case you might want to _listen_ to this. Mother wrote me about it last week, it was all over the papers-"

"Yes, we have those here too, Ford-"

"Not the rag you wrap the fish in, Jerry, an actual newspaper. In St Petersburg, there was a terrible dispute between two nationally esteemed intellectuals, who argued for _days_ over what the highest form of literature was, poetry or prose-"

"Poetry!" Walter and Di called out together, colliding with another call of "Prose!" from Jem and Faith.

Jerry sniffed. These Blythes, sometimes they seemed like perfect heathens. His sister Faith at least should know that the greatest and most beautiful word of all was the Word of God.

"So," asked Nan, "which was decided on?"

"It wasn't. When they couldn't agree, the poet shot the other in the heart and then he shot himself."

"Oh, _Ken-neth_!" Nan grumbled, perhaps there was something of the annoying big brother about him after all.

"Those Russians," Jem huffed, with equal disdain, "You wouldn't want to depend on them in a pinch."

"We may have to yet," Jerry said, "if those ancient warhorses ever show some sack. All this to-ing and fro-ing, at this rate it'll be our _sons_ who'll be fighting for glory."

Nan blushed a perfect rose, wondering if Jerry was referring to _their_ future sons or just sons in general. Walter too, felt flushed with feeling. He knelt up and looked at the boys, his eyes like cold grey sparks.

"_Glory?_ What glory is there in fighting for those ancient war-horses, as you call them? We ought to be turning every fibre of our hearts to the hope of a lasting peace-"

"I'll tell you where the glory is, little brother," Jem fired back, "in travelling to shores far from our own to defend _their_ right to live freely as we do."

"If Mother England and the Prussians stayed on their own turf we wouldn't _need_ to go abroad."

"All this talk of the pre-Raphaelites, Walter, yet you seem to forget before everything else they were a _brotherhood._ You sound as though nothing could make you leave the Island. Who would you have go and fight for you -Di, little Rilla?"

"Jem!" Faith cut in, her eyes flashing. "He doesn't mean that Walter. Do you, James?"

Jem went quiet as he realised the bitterness of his words. It was this constant talk of war that was the cause of it; like a virus that spread to even the farthest reaches of the little isle of Prince Edward. He noticed his hand was balled in a fist and unclenching it reached over to scruff Walter's floppy black hair.

"No hard feelings, brother?" he said, quickly. "Of course, you have no taste for war. I forget how ill you've been." Jem hadn't forgotten and Walter knew he hadn't. Still it was good of him to say so. "You won't have lift a toe off this ol' rock if you don't wish to. Your name will travel the world for you instead."

"Walter, do you mean to say they published those poems?" Ken asked. He was as eager as any of them to change the subject, but such news was a sincere joy to him. "You never said a word, you sly dog. This wants celebrating!"

"Oof," Nan whimpered, smoothing her hands down her belly, "I thought we _had_ celebrated-"

"We were waiting for Mother and Father to return from Avonlea," said Walter, quietly. "We thought tomorrow..."

"Dash tomorrow, we won't have such a time with them at table," and Susan to boot, Ken grimaced. "What say we take that private room above the coach house at the station? This news deserves something better than warm lemonade."

"Ah, I see a dark cloud on the horizon," Jerry interrupted, leaning on his elbow to have a better look at the two figures coming up the lane to Ingleside. Jem recognised his manner immediately and shuffled away from Faith.

"Friend or foe?" he asked, before looking out to the gate where Jerry's eyes were fixed.

"Depends upon the hour, I'd say," Jerry replied, "that woman has more moods than your cat." If the Blythes were verging on pagan in Jerry Meredith's book then Gertrude Oliver was a positive witch.

"Hardly a black cloud though, Jerry," Ken said, driven by curiosity to look now and liking what he saw. "She looks the sweetest puff of light I've ever seen."

"No, you dolt, that figure in black sliding in the shadows next to her."

Ken gave that tiny woman a cursory glance, but what was there to hold his attention compared to the angel who walked by her side? Like a long stem of cherry blossom, her lithe arms swinging over filmy white skirts, her hair worn loose in chestnut waves. With dusky downcast eyes and an utterly kissable mouth, she was loveliness itself.

Ken found himself sitting straighter and raking back his hair, his feet twitching with boyish impatience. It was faintly ridiculous to come over like this and yet here he was scanning the faces of the males in his company watching their reaction. Jem and Jerry were obviously more gone than he had supposed to treat this girl's approach with such composure. His only other rival, the dark and brooding Walter, looked over at two girls with nothing more than a brotherly smile. Well, that was that, surely this little sea-side village had no other suitor who might outshine him. They must insist that she come to the party tonight.

His skin began to prickle as a beguiling fragrance whispered over him, that seemed -improbable but true- of this radiant girl. It was as though he felt her before he saw her -this was only supposed to happen in books! He could not resist turning his head to gaze at her again. And she was looking straight at _him_.

She was smiling, she was blushing...

She was Rilla!

**... ... ...**

_Thank you for reading :o)_**  
><strong>


	2. The Trouble with the Blythes

**The Trouble with the Blythes**

_In which a spider catches Kenneth Ford; Walter catches on; and Gertrude Oliver cannot catch a break  
><em>

**_Ingleside, Glen St Mary; July 1914 ~later that same day.  
><em>**

He might have laughed about it before but Kenneth Ford was rather fond of the dimly lit house now. It cooled and more importantly obscured a hideously hot, red face. For that is what it had been. Hideous.

What exactly had come over him just now? Perhaps there had been something else in that lukewarm lemonade, though he doubted Susan had the imagination for such a thing. How to explain then that _he,_ Captain of the Blues, editor of the Toronto Tatler, host of the notorious Artists and Muses Ball, and in all ways very much the scholar and the gentleman, had been ogling -it was a harsh description but if the cap fit- the Blythe baby!

He took a tentative look outside. She was still standing by Di, though he knew she'd been invited to sit for he had offered her his own spot on the lawn before she even had time to open her mouth. The expression on her face was the same too, with her bottom lip pinched and eyes wide. Fire coloured eyes that burned straight into him, though the gloom of the hallway must have kept him from sight. He hoped it did and retreated further inside, only to collide with three umbrellas jutting out from the hallstand like a gaggle of geese. A sharp stab of pain went through his ankle, the sort that would always remind him of the rotten tackle that caused it. How was it then that he wasn't thinking of his foot at all -least of all the damned game- but whether Rilla could still see him?

Ken could still see her, even when he turned to make his way to the 'phone near Susan's kitchen. He'd said he should inquire about the room above the coach house, but as he picked up the receiver he half wished to hear it was unavailable. It was likely Rilla would be invited to join them and that was the last thing he wanted. Ken hadn't seen her in nearly two years and would be happy for twice that time to pass before he set his eyes on her again. He would be an old man by then, four years was a lifetime for a child.

She had been so ready to welcome back her old playmate. Didn't he help fell an old birch for her tree tower the last time he saw her? They'd played tug-o-war with the saw, chopping down the trunk to make stools and thinner slices for a stepping stone path. He and Walter and one of the Merediths -was it Carl or Una? Someone with dark blue eyes at least- had sat down to tea. Crouching low with knees colliding, as little Rilla proudly poured out into old china cups. She had steeped lemon-balm and spearmint in the sweet water of the Valley stream, he suddenly remembered, and jolly nice it was, too.

Ken hadn't looked at Rilla twice then, and she hadn't changed all that much. She was certainly much taller, with arms and legs all over the show -she looked a proper little spider. But her hair was the same glossy chestnut. Her face the same creamy oval, with golden dapples over her nose and the apples of her cheeks; the same questioning stare from her long lashed, wide, hazel eyes...

But no, somehow not the same. Not the same at all.

He felt someone's eyes him and turned to see Rilla standing at the front door observing him curiously. Ken made a show of being busy on the 'phone, but it was only when she had gone from sight that he trusted himself to speak, and put the call through to the coach house.

**… … …**

"All set then, Ford?" Jem called to Ken, as he made his slow approach back to the lawn. "Don't think you have to stump up for this, you know." Jem knew the type who let Owen Ford's son pay for everything and never meant to be one of them.

Ken looked at his friends in a dull sort of stupor. He felt as though they were staring at him, Jem and Faith, the twins and Walter. His whole body pulsed, the throb in his foot and the one in his chest, it seemed impossible no one noticed.

"You don't look right," Walter said. He had been cloud gazing but when Ken returned he propped himself up on his elbow.

"It's this blasted ankle," and it was, of course it was. "I knocked it on the hall stand. I really shouldn't have been playing tennis."

"No, you shouldn't have," Nan said. "Come and have a sit by me."

Which he did, though he regretted it. Not for the look on Jerry's face, but because his position didn't provide a clear view of the house. He wanted to be prepared for when Rilla came back to join them.

"What time shall we set off, do you think, will I have time to pin my hair properly," Nan asked him. She brought her hands up to tease out the coronet Di had braided about her head; one boy in particular wondering if it was not only hair being teased.

"You look lovely as you are, Nan," Jerry ventured.

The thrill Nan felt at the compliment would have shown itself had she not just hit upon an untimely tangle. She was smiling on the inside, however. On the inside she was feeling the dear old world really was the most perfect place. Perhaps she wouldn't go back on her swap after all. Then if she didn't have time to set her hair she could wear Rilla's cap. Something would have to be done about Di though.

"I know very well what you're thinking, Nan, I'll go and change in a mo'," Di laughed, "I wondered if I might try on that little number Persis sent you."

There! What had she said to herself not an hour ago. "Persis _is_ clever and it really is the most glorious colour," Nan said, carefully. "Though between you and me," and the four others in their midst -but that was no matter at Ingleside where everyone knew everyone's business, or thought they they did- "I think her idea of fashion is not quite the same as mine." She gave a shy glance at Ken by way of an apology, but he showed no sign of having heard her.

"That little lady go off then?" he asked.

"Miss Oliver, you mean?" Faith said. "You haven't been introduced yet, have you, Ken? You left so smartly when she arrived I almost thought you were avoiding her. Don't be deceived by my dear brother. She's race of Josephy through and through, isn't she Di?"

"Through and through!" Di grinned. "We can't all be little rays of sunshine, you know," this said especially for Jerry's benefit, who was looking like a little black cloud himself. "The world needs the other seasons too, don't forget. She's staying with us, in Rilla's room-"

"The two of them are thick as thieves," Nan interjected, "it's so sweet the way they get on, though Miss Oliver is even older than _you_."

Ken pinched at a daisy and began to pluck out its petals. "Older than me?"

"Bruce is like that, too," Faith added, thinking of her father and Rosemary's son. "Your little shadow, isn't he, Jem? I suppose it comes from being the baby of the family. You become so used to everyone being older it no longer seems a barrier to friendship."

"Not that it rubs off on her," Jem replied, tossing the remnants of their picnic into the hampers. "Rather she seems to bring out the child in everyone."

"I think that's one of the loveliest things you've ever said, brother," Walter said, smiling. "Shame Puss wasn't here to hear it." He took one hand that cradled his head and scratched at his nose.

"_I'm_ not," said Jem, testily. When he agreed to Faith's demand that he put on the afternoon tea if she beat him in tennis it never occurred to him she meant the tidying up as well. "I can imagine her being quite offended and snubbing me for days after- I _am_ going on thixteen, you know!" he said, in a fair imitation of his littlest sister.

"You missed a cup," Faith laughed.

"A _lot_ younger than Miss Oliver," Ken muttered.

"The silly sausage just turned fifteen," said Di. "You and Persis sent her that outrageous silver cuff, didn't you?" Ken, of course, had no idea -he hadn't even signed the card. "She won't take it off, you know, even though it dangles round her wrist like a manacle."

Kenneth Ford was not the son of an author for nothing and sighed inwardly at the a poetic justice of such a gift. He felt, Lord help him_,_ he felt tied to her. Even now it was as though he sensed her move about the house upstairs, and the only way he could give relief to this was by asking about the woman who was up there with her. "And how long is she staying, Miss Oliver ...will she come out tonight do you think?"

Nan and Di shared such a look now, a whole conversation the way only twins can. Are you thinking what I'm thinking? No! Yes! He can't stop talking about her! So I noticed! Pulling petals to boot! Noticed that, too! Ken likes Gertrude Oliver! No! Yes! And so it went on. It fell to Faith to answer him again.

"No, poor soul, she had another head coming on so they came back early from the Simon Elliot's. Rilla's seeing to her-"

"So, she won't be coming tonight?" The poor flower in Ken's hand worried to nothing.

"Miss Oliver?" Faith asked.

"Or-" Ken said.

"Or?" Faith repeated.

"Rilla." How strange her name sounded, Ken looked about with a wary eye expecting his friends to point at him and shout, Hah! We knew it! The rest of his friends _were_ pointing and staring, but not at Kenneth.

"Rilla!"

"Oh, Rilla!"

"Rilla, my dear, what have you come as?"

Ken turned back to look at the girl who stood before him and she was not what she was before. Not in her diaphanous white summer dress but in something else altogether. Something that had Persis Ford written, or rather sewn, all over it.

"That's one of my sister's," Ken exclaimed, of the butterfly sleeves and hobble skirt that was wearing Rilla Blythe.

Rilla bobbed about in the jade green sheath with an uninhibited glee. "I thought I'd wear it to the party tonight!" she said, excitedly.

Though she wasn't yet in long skirts Ken felt he was looking at more of Rilla than he had ever seen before. There was something about that dress that seemed almost indecent. Her arms and legs were so exposed and there was such a _lot _of them. She looked like a shiny beetle and more spidery than ever. What on earth had he been thinking? This was Rilla, _little_ Rilla! He laughed at his own stupidity and with sincere relief.

"_You're_ not coming, spider!" Ken burst out. "Grown-ups only, I'm afraid."

Rilla went white, then a nasty shade of red as she gave an imploring look to Di and Walter.

"We never promised you could come, Puss, only that you might ask," Walter said, with a sympathetic smile. "But you know it's just as well. Susan would certainly say no-"

"I don't _want_ to go anyway," she declared, "I'd rather remain here and take care of a _real_ friend!"

Ken turned away for the briefest moment before remembering that unlike Rilla he was not a child. "Don't be like that, my little spider-"

She glared at him with eyes like bonfires. "I am not your ... _anything_, Kenneth Ford," she spat, "and I never, _ever_ will be!"

**... ... ...**

There are parties and there are parties. Ones you attend with your feet dragging that you leave at dawn with your heels in your hand. And ones you can't wait to attend and then find yourself wondering that only an hour has passed. Unfortunately the Blythes, the Merediths, and Kenneth Ford were mired in the latter.

After all the toasts to Walter and to _'The Sun Rescinds_', then to parents and friends and reviewers -let them be kind, lest Walter be sent to an untimely grave like that poor John Keats- no one had much of an appetite. They sat round the table picking and sipping as the conversation turned predictably to war, because rightly or wrongly it was foremost on their minds. But also because other more prickly conversations must wait.

For instance, Nan wondered, did Jerry really have to leave before the cheese course so that he could help his father go over tomorrow's sermon?

"Some of us have work to do," he'd said darkly.

"But it's Sunday tomorrow!" Ken exclaimed, pouring a drink.

"I meant _God's_ work."

And there was not a hint of that lopsided grin on his face, or much of one on Jem's when Jerry insisted that Faith come home with him.

Nan hoped she might at least steal Di away to chat about this mad pash Ken Ford had for -of _all_ people- Gertrude Oliver! She was ages older than he was, and more importantly had an _understanding_ with a banker in Charlottetown. Who should be the one to tell him that _Miss_ Oliver was soon to become _Mrs_ Grant? Instead Di was talking about _fishing lures_ with Jerry's younger brother, Carl. Even though Nan had been staring at Di in that 'we need to talk' sort of way, Di, it seemed, would rather argue over the comparative merits of grubs versus winged insects -and didn't Carl have such a lot to say about that!

This all came of Jerry up and leaving so mysteriously. Only three days ago they had been debating on the veranda steps till almost eleven. When Father met up with their red cheeked selves on his way back from a chamber pot vigil, waiting for Emlyn McAllister to pass a tiger's eye brooch -it looked like a caramel!- he gave Jerry an especially hearty clap on the back.

"Why ever did you do such a peculiar thing?" Nan asked her father the next morning.

Gilbert laughed, "I thought he needed some encouragement after parrying with you all night. I could hear you from a mile away, Nan Blythe. You went on so long I began to think you were talking to yourself. Then to find Jerry Meredith at my doorstep trying to get a word in edgewise. Let's just say I knew how the poor fellow felt."

Well, it wasn't everyday you had the chance to sink your teeth into some really meaningful conversation. Jerry had a way of making her want to declare a black thing white. And now here she was stuck at this table, an unwilling audience to the kinds of conversations you might just as well have in your maiden aunt's sitting room.

"-libellula lydia?-" Di asked.

"-an unending stalemate-" Jem grumbled.

"-and then tie it in such a way-" Carl was explaining.

"-the Piper is drawing his breath-" said Walter, ominously.

And Kenneth Ford pouring himself _another_ drink!

A moonlit stroll home on the arm of that black haired, black eyed boy would have been just the ticket. If only he had asked her. Why, pray tell, didn't someone want to talk about _that_?

"Nan, can I tempt you?" Ken asked her, sliding a tumbler across the table.

Nan fondled the glass for a moment, swirling the contents round. "I really shouldn't. Actually I won't, and neither should _you_, Kenneth Ford."

"You sound like Persis," Ken smiled.

"We see eye to eye on that at least!" she laughed.

It was an uncommon talent of the Blythes, to be honest to the feeling within them in one moment then letting it go with the wind in the next.

"That dress not to your taste I take it?" Ken asked her, his grey eyes twinkling.

"Or yours!" Nan bit back. "Poor Rilla... You know you were awfully hard on her, Ken."

He didn't need telling, he felt bad for the kid. "Not _awfully_, I hope. I never said anything I haven't said before... anything that _you_ haven't said before-"

"Yes, but she wasn't _fifteen_ before!"

No, she wasn't.

"Nan!" Di called across the table. Ken and her sister were looking very cosy she noticed. Nan's darling face and attentive nature, she little realised the long line of youths who had fallen under her spell. Not that someone so worldly-wise as Kenneth Ford would succumb to the charms of an Island rose, but still... "Time to go, I think. Mother's rostered to do the flowers for the service tomorrow and we promised to do them in her stead, so we'll have to be up extra early."

"Allow me," said Jem, holding out his elbow and inviting Carl to do the same. "Shall we escort you home, m'ladies?"

The room was left to Walter and Ken. They dragged a pair of armchairs which sat by the empty fireplace over to a large open window; the smell of salt, leaf and coal blowing softly through the room. Ken sat down opposite his friend and began to unlace his shoe. Walter grabbed his ankle gently and finished the job then placed it on his knee.

"Sock not too ripe, I hope," Ken joked.

"I assumed that was why you sat by an opened window," Walter replied. He leaned back and closed his eyes, cradling his head with his hands as he always did, as if he struggled to contain the all words inside clamouring to be written down.

"So, old man," Ken said, after a while, "published at last."

Walter opened his eyes but they remained fixed on the ceiling. "Hardly _at last_, Mr Ford, they accepted me straight away thanks to you. If you hadn't got my foot in the door at your father's publishers-"

"Your foot in the door is all I got you, Walt. The rest you did yourself."

"And you really think it's good?" He stared at Ken and felt his cheeks redden. He hated to look as though he fished for a compliment, Ken's toast had been excruciating enough, but it mattered to Walter in a way he could not articulate that Kenneth Ford liked what he had written.

"Father almost wept," Ken said. Not for the first time he wondered if the literary genius that was Owen Ford hadn't wished for just a moment that his own son had written something half so brilliant.

"But what about _you_?" Walter insisted.

What was it with these Blythes, was there something in the Glen water that caused their eyes to see into your very soul? Ken poked about in his pocket and pulled out a slim silver case. "There was an inexcusable split infinitive and I question the choice of type set... but other than that-"

"Ratbag!"

"I only know how to edit this stuff, I could never actually _write_ it." He snapped a match in one slick stroke and fired the end of his cigarette. "Care for one?" he asked Walter, who shook his head emphatically.

"Are you planning to corrupt all the fine young Blythes while the Doctor is away? I saw you plying Nan with alcohol," he teased.

"I was being a good host."

"Is that what you call it?"

"I keep forgetting we're playing by the Island rules now. I suppose I'll read about our engagement in the 'Glen Notes' tomorrow," Ken said, flicking a length of ash out the window.

"Not unless you fancy pistols at dawn with a certain minister's son." said Walter, raising his eyebrows. "But you can take your pick from the rest of my darling sisters. I, for one, would adore you for a brother-"

Ken inhaled so hard he scorched the back of his throat, and made several uncomfortable and unappealing hacks before he could catch his breath again.

"I take it I'm not the first to try and marry off a sister to you," Walter laughed, handing his friend a drink.

Ken tossed the rest of his cigarette into the street below and took a short swig with a nod of thanks.

"Your sisters are in need of no such assistance. Jerry's eyes are firmly fixed -though whether Nan sees it is another matter. And Di, well... when it comes to Di you can be sure that _she_ will be the one doing the choosing."

That she will, Walter thought. He could comfortably offer Di's hand when he knew there was no danger of actually losing her. He wondered if she dared to risk her heart again. His youngest sister, however, clearly longed to offer hers.

"And Rilla-my-Rilla?"

Ken looked at Walter blankly and slid his foot to the floor. "Rilla-your-Rilla?"

"Is she?" Walter asked him. "Is she Rilla-_your_-Rilla?"

Those damnable Blythe eyes always peering into things that shouldn't be looked upon. "I should say not. Rilla is a child!"

"Aren't we all," was all Walter would say.

**… … …**

"I am _not_ a child!"

Rilla fell upon the counterpane and thumped her fist into it. Silver light from a high moon poured through the window and lit upon her face, washing away the red in her eyes with more success than the woman next to her.

"There, there," Gertrude Oliver said, her low voice more from tiredness than gentleness, "I didn't think he called you one exactly."

"He didn't _have_ to. He said the party was for _grown-ups_! And _then_ he invited Shirley and Una!" Rilla declared, her face a perfect picture of contempt.

"Knowing they wouldn't come-" Gertrude reasoned, trying to stifle a yawn.

"That's not the _point!_"

"Well, darling, what _is _the point? You've been going round in circles for hours, and just when I think you've come to some sort of resolution you fire up all over again."

"I can _never_ forgive him, Miss Oliver," Rilla said, her hazel eyes large with the import of her words. "I know it's wicked, but he hurt my feelings _excruciatingly_."

Gertrude wondered if now was the time for one of those hearty moral lessons that teachers were supposed to be so fond of. But was of the opinion that Rilla would only see it as another injustice to rail against; it would only fire her up _again _and it was already midnight!

"God will forgive you even if you don't," Gertrude said, comfortably.

"And I won't, I can promise you that. I -I -I _hate_ Kenneth Ford!"

She said the word with all the vehemence of profanity, expecting Miss Oliver to chide her severely. For wasn't she _just_ a child, a silly little child who should be chastised and spanked for such a speech? Her own sweet mother would have looked at her with awfully disappointed eyes if Rilla had dared admit to such a thing.

Indeed Anne Blythe might have revised her high opinion of Gertrude Oliver if she could have heard the woman's response to her baby girl. For Gertrude believed one could not be moved to hate if one hadn't first been moved to love. They were both sides of the same coin in her mind. Or in Ingleside parlance- both sides of the same cat. She flopped back onto Rilla's downy bed and fingered her dark hair thoughtfully, twisting it tightly about her temples which throbbed with a dull little ache.

"Hate him do you?" Gertrude asked, thinking of the handsome man she had glimpsed so far. She supposed it might be quite a thing to hate someone like Kenneth Ford. She was sure she might have hated him herself, ten years ago. "Well, that's alright, then. I was worried that perhaps you wouldn't forgive him -more worried still that my part in all this was to talk you into it. But now I see there's really no need-"

"No need..?" Where was the comfort in that? To be told one could bear hateful grudges until the day one died. It didn't help Rilla at all.

"You'll forgive him alright." Gertrude's eyes like glowing coals whose crackle seemed to laugh at her.

How wrong she was, Rilla thought_, _spitefully_. No one_ understood her, _no one_ knew a pain like this... And didn't that feel so much better!

"But he thinks I'm a _child, _Miss Oliver ! And he called me a... a .._._a _spider!_" she wailed, luxuriating in the injustice as another crying jag ensued.

Gertrude groaned, pulling herself up and patting the girl as a mother might soothe a colicky babe. Drat you Kenneth Ford, she thought. Have a care for a poor old teacher with a splitting head. Next time you decide to play the cad save it for someone your own size!

**… … …**

_Thank you for taking the time to read, I hope you come to love the Glen St Mary characters as much as those in Avonlea**  
><strong>_


	3. Words Said and Not Said

**Words Said and Not Said**

_In which Kenneth Ford has girl trouble; Anne and Walter go hunting; and Rilla and Dog Monday have a waltz_

_**Hollyhocks, Over-Harbour; August, 1914**_

"You just missed your visitor!" the mistress of Hollyhocks said with a wink as Kenneth Ford hobbled through the kitchen door.

Ken looked down the long dusty table at the woman who was pummelling the dough for the next morning's bread. Her strong brown forearms making short work of the pasty pillow as she slapped it about with a practiced hand.

"Brown bread or sour dough, Mim?" he asked, giving his cousin a quick peck on her ruddy cheek.

"Neither, as you can see," Miriam West replied. It ever was and would be the same fine crumbed, white sort she always made, and utterly unthinkable for her Martin to have his morning marmalade on anything else.

"I was speaking of my visitor," said Ken, sitting down with a look on his face as though butter would have a better chance melting on the unbaked loaves than in his mouth.

"Far be it from me, a mere Over-Harbour girl, to guess what you mean by _that_!" Mim said.

She gave her cousin a stare, the sort Persis would give him as she passed the receiver when _another_ girl had 'phoned for him. For Kenneth Ford would not come _all_ the way round to the back of the house -_and_ with a bad foot- unless he'd meant to miss _someone_ coming out the front.

"She brought you these," Mim announced grandly, dropping four letters in front of him, a small cloud of flour rising up where they had landed. Ken recognised his sister's writing on the uppermost envelope but it was the colour of the third one that caught his eye.

Mim put the loaves to bed, observing to her satisfaction that the creeping blush on Ken's face rightly corresponded to the pinched look of the young Miss who had delivered his mail. It had not escaped anybody's notice -in this kitchen or in the Glen- that every single letter come to Mr Kenneth Ford this summer had been written by a different woman.

"Now go on with you. I've got to clean the table down, so out to the porch and I'll bring us some tea in a jiff," Mim barked, with a fondness only kith and kin of the Wests could have discerned. "And mind how you open 'em," she called as the screen door whomped in her face, "Francis wants them stamps!"

Ken shuffled through the letters and brought out the sage green envelope. The stamp was a real prize for Frankie, a delicate blue filigree, illegible to anyone here but the man who looked at it now. He carefully pulled out the wafer thin pages that enclosed a small, sepia photograph. And he saw her, Naoko, still as beautiful as she was at fifteen, and in her arms the swaddled, sleeping babe that was her first born son.

"_We named him for my grandfather,"_ Ken read, _"but he is such a big, jolly boy, we always call him Kenta. He makes me laugh and think of you."_

Mim came to the porch and lowered a heavy tray of tea things onto the small wicker table between two rocking-chairs.

"Anything interesting?" she asked, slipping back into her seat with a well earned oomph.

"Mrs Sato writes with news of her second child, a son," Ken said, holding up the photograph for Mim to have a look at. The picture was given a cursory glance.

"She from that family you stayed with when you were a boy?"

"The Tanaka's, yes. They hosted us in '07 when father took us to live there for a year. We never lost touch..."

He had wanted to. When Tanaka San's daughter would not go against the wishes of her family and spurn the husband meant for her when she turned eighteen, it was a hot headed, heart broken lad who had vowed he would never speak to her again. Ken almost cringed to remember his threats. And the poetry! If Walter Blythe ever saw a line of it he might not care so much for Ken's good opinion.

He sipped at his tea, the hot cup lingered on his lip and he flinched at the thought that there might be such a boy in the Glen. Some hot-headed swain who threw pebbles at Rilla's window and made impossible plans for them to run away together. The front door sounded with a firm and persistent tap and Mim hauled herself up and stomped down the hall. Ken had just opened an invitation to the wedding of Helena Holdstock -the Helena who had hoped to become the next Mrs Ford- when a shrill voice came from the kitchen.

"Fancy!" Ethel Reese exclaimed, of the missing hat she could not attend tonight's prayer meeting without. "Well, I was just _sure_ it must be here."

Miriam West was rather more sure it was not. She remembered very plainly that young Miss Reese took quite some time adjusting that hat, preening in the mirror by the front door in a vain effort to prolong her visit. She heard the unmistakable squeak of the rocking chair signalling her cousin was making his escape into the back garden, while Ethel was asking if Kenneth had returned home yet.

"Yes, he _did_ get those letters and was _most_ grateful, Ethel. I'm sure he'll be _very_ sad to have missed you _again,_" Mim said in an overly loud, gregarious voice.

Well, if Leslie West's boy was going to leave her in the company of that sly Reese girl for another half hour wouldn't she have something to say about it!

**… … …**

Ken walked under the large spruce that sheltered the chicken run and pulled another letter from his jacket pocket. He was wise enough to save his sister's letter till last, knowing he would be in need of a good laugh after he tackled the next. A lengthy epistle from a girl who had taken to haunting the Ford residence with a fervour that even Ethel Reese might blush at. Not even stern words from Leslie Ford, a woman never known to suffer fools, could dissuade the lass. In the end his mother had hinted that even though the rest of the family were unable to take up the cottage at Four Winds this year, a quiet visit to the West's Over-Harbour might be just the ticket for her son.

_"Desolate without you... left without a word... scoundrel ...love you madly ...never can forgive you ...can't wait till you get back..."_

And so it went on for ten pages on both sides. They had attended a few literary events together during that dull winter when he was still on crutches. But when one doesn't dance one can spend too much time talking. And Ken Ford had a way of listening, with a captivated look in his long lashed, grey eyes, that made a girl feel like the only one in the room. Dear old Daphne! Still perhaps some masterpiece might come from it. Wasn't heartbreak the source of so much literature? He thought of his own little haikus to Naoko, imagining what someone like Rilla might say to such purple declarations, and laughed into the wind.

Beyond the spruce there was wall of thick hedge that separated Hollyhocks from the small dunes beyond, and Ken made his way through there now. Here the Island held up one lone arm against the pounding seas of the Gulf in the shape of mile long bar of shifting, white sand. He was always drawn to this spot and when staying at Four Winds would often take a boat out across the short distance from the Light to the bar, which enclosed the harbour like a mother's arms.

A squally breeze played with his hair, whipping up sand more grey than gold. But for his clothing and muted blues of sky and sea there was no colour to be seen, save a ribbon of red hair that waved like a banner two hundred yards from him. Ken sat near a mound of sea grass, staring as if he gazed at a fairy, with equal measures disbelief and relief that such magic did exist in this world.

"She's beautiful, isn't she?"

Ken turned against the wind and saw Walter Blythe standing above him watching the same figure skipping down the beach. It was not so surprising to see him, he knew Walter liked it here as much as he did. There was a power in this place, a last gasp of fineness against the brute force of the sea that answered something in both of them.

"Is that... Di?" Ken asked, gazing down the shore.

Walter hunkered next to him, his open necked shirt plastered against his chest. When Ken gave him a welcoming smile he was thinking how thin he looked, how close the typhoid had come to taking him.

"Can you keep a secret?" Walter said.

"You know that I can."

"That's Mother."

"Anne! -Mrs, Mrs Blythe?" Ken looked back at his friend in amazement.

"She's trying to catch a poem for me-"

"Catch a poem?"

"You don't do that in Toronto?" Walter said with a smirk.

"You don't do that in P.E.I."

"That's why the secret. If the excellent women of the Ladies Aid knew what Mother got up to..." Walter sucked in his cheeks and crossed his eyes as a smaller, cheekier Jem used to do.

Oh, for those days now, Ken thought, when war was never thought of and Rilla Blythe was still in rompers. "So you need to _catch_ a poem, do you?" It was the opposite of what his father went through. A story took Owen Ford like a fever, it seemed to catch _him_.

"We usually run about the beach like lunatics, but Mother worries I'm not strong enough so she's trying to trap one for me," Walter said, watching Anne as she held up her shawl like a sail.

Ken turned to where Walter was looking remembering the story his mother had told him about the first time she had met the singular beauty that was Anne Blythe, tripping down the shore with a beaming joy that Leslie had both admired and envied. His family owed so much to Anne, and to Gilbert too. Dr Blythe was just a novice in his field, and in a time when most men would be carefully tending their reputations he had risked both his name -and his wife's anger_-_ to do what he thought was right for Leslie. And the truth had set her free.

"Look at her," Walter laughed, "like an angel trying to get back to heaven."

"Your mother has always seemed very much of the earth to me," Ken said, with an affectionate smile. "When Father told me tales when I was a boy about a man who loved a tree maiden I would often picture your parents."

"Not your own?" Walter asked. Ken looked back at him and saw the frank surprise in his friend's face.

"What- no, not at all. Owen Ford is a_ god_, you know. And Mother... Mother is Persephone ...enduring the dark days whilst Dad writes."

"Doesn't sound like much of a life for the one tied to it," said Walter, absently. He always enjoyed talking to Ken but there was another conversation in his head that he was finding difficult to ignore.

"It rarely is," Ken replied, observing the crashing surf and thinking of the spite and jealousy endured by his literary friends. Anne Blythe whooped at the water, her voice carried upon rushing, salty air. "But you know," he looked at Walter again and grinned, "I think Mother prefers those days because Father is hers alone. It's when the book is out that she has to share him with the world again."

Walter traced circles in the sand beneath his bare feet. "Mythical indeed..." he muttered.

Ken knew that the boy next to him was not thinking of Leslie and Owen Ford. "What is?"

"The perfect woman."

"Made of all the gold/ And all the silver/ Made of all the wheat/ And all the earth/ Made of the water/ Made of the sea/ Made for my arms/ Made for my soul," Ken said, lying back against the incline of the dune. "Sound like anyone you know?"

Walter was funnelling the fine white sand through his hand as Ken recited the lines of one of his poems. With every word spoken and with each grain that fell there was Faith. Golden eyed, silver voiced. Until Ken stopped speaking and Walter saw his love for the elusive Miss Meredith no more real than what he held in his empty hand.

"Walter darling, where is your sweater?" Anne called out, an impish breeze tumbling the skirts about her bare ankles as she walked over to them. "The wind is seething as though it wanted to get inside you and take shelter from itself. Hello Ken, dear. I see Mrs West made sure you dressed up warm, she's a rarer mother than I."

Surely such a woman did not exist, Ken surmised, gazing at the flushed, bright eyed face Anne Blythe had blessed her daughters with, and pulling himself up to greet her. "We were just discussing the perfect woman."

Though she was a jolly, capable thing Anne did not think that Miriam West would quite stretch to that. "Oh, how dull, I might go back and fetch some seaweed after all. It's very good for our potatoes but it makes an even better cover for our antics doesn't it, Walter? Some people think" -here her eyes darted inland to Lowbridge and the Upper Glen- "that barefoot strolls are for dogs and vagabonds, _not_ for Doctor's wives and Redmond scholars. But _you_, dearest boy, were born of the race who knows Joseph, to the most _Josephy_ mother at that. So I dare say you will understand," she fell to her knees and ruffled Ken's wild hair. "We are not here to admire the view, you know," Anne looked briefly at her son's face to see if she might share their secret, "but to _catch_ a poem!"

"My net has a few holes in it," Walter added.

"Walter is working on a most exquisite sequence -may I tell him, Walter? I think it has the makings of an epic. We are forever in debate. I always want to add another stanza and my curious son is always wanting to cut, cut, cut. Oh, the wind this afternoon! I seemed to _eat_ entire phrases. I hope it won't turn a gale. My littlest girlio has her heart set on a golden evening for the dance at the Light tomorrow."

"You're letting _Rilla_ go?" Ken said.

"She's really too young-" Anne began, in a tone that revealed the only person she was trying to convince was herself, "it was only that I wanted her to have a chance to wear that magnificent creation of hers when she worked _so_ hard on it. Though I think it was equally difficult batting Nan away -she _would_ put her oar in! But as soon as I saw her in it... Oh she looks a dream. How could I say no? Who knows when she might have another chance..."

It was not the dress that caused Anne to relent and everyone older than fifteen knew this. It was war. Crowding out all other thoughts, spoiling and souring the most innocent pleasures; a young girl's bright tomorrows, a woman's softly faded yesterdays. Last month Anne had walked among the beloved haunts of old and for the first time the golden memories of her girlhood were overcome by darker thoughts as she imagined what war could have taken from her own blessed girlhood. What her life would have been like without AVIS, Redmond and Patty's Place. Without Charlie, Moody, Fred and Roy... Without Gilbert.

The news today was so discouraging. It would not be long, it already pressed down on her darlings, threatening to destroy all the joy that should be theirs. The sweetest joys that belong only to the young. How could she deny her girl, who knew if the boys Rilla danced with tomorrow would follow the Piper and never return?

Walter felt his mother's unshed tears prick his own eyes. There would be enough time to cry, he knew. But not here and not yet. He was determined to make her smile again and if he had to tease the life out of Kenneth Ford so much the better.

"I think tomorrow means more than just a chance to strut about in a new green dress-"

"Green?" Ken said, "When I think of Rilla I always think of her in white-"

"When _you_ think of Rilla?" Walter smirked.

Anne joined him with a quizzical grin. "I suppose now I think of it she always does wear white. The green was surely Nan's influence -though don't you _dare_ to say so!" Anne demanded of Rilla's beloved big brother, before turning to Ken. "Funny boy, fancy you noticing that-"

"Fancy!" Walter said.

"It comes of growing up with Persis," Ken mumbled -horribly unconvincingly Walter thought- "she's always chewing my ear about frivolous things."

"A girl's first dance in not frivolous. You're not so old that you don't remember yours, I bet." Ken glared at Walter, both for the smug look in his eyes and for bringing to mind his awkward effort to teach Naoko the foxtrot.

"A girl's first dance?" Anne said, shuffling her bare feet under her skirts. "You make it sound as though she had a sweetheart, Walter. Rilla is _far_ too young."

Rilla's houses were still made of tree stumps not of dreams_,_ Anne reasoned, neither willing nor wanting to remember how young she had been when those first arrows hit. That piercing sting as a certain hazel eyed boy escorted Ruby Gillis from the station on their weekends home from Queens. The silken flush that fused through her when the same boy stood by her side at Miss Lavendar's wedding.

Little Rilla could not possibly know the exquisite pang and softest flutter that was first love.

Anne turned her thoughtful grey eyes from the sea and watched a silent conversation Walter and Kenneth were caught up in now, her son having the better part of it too. She had once thought Jem's claim to his friendship was the stronger. But if Faith answered to a red-gold sun and not a black and silver moon -no one writing poetry with Walter could fail to realise who those sonnets were addressed to- let him at least have dear old Kenneth Ford to make him laugh again.

"You two had better ask her to dance!" Anne said, poking her finger into their arms playfully.

"Oh, _he's_ not going!" Walter gasped, gesturing to Ken with a flop of his hair. "_The _Kenneth Ford at a little country dance?"

"I might," Ken replied.

"You! What, to help out with the refreshments, hop-a-long?"

"Mmm, thought I might give Miss Meredith a hand. Minister's daughters don't dance either, do they?"

Anne noticed another look pass between them and decided that now would be a good time to get moving, the breeze was turning chill.

"Come on, help your mother up. My ankle is starting to ache. It's one of the few blessings about broken bones, even if you can't dance it becomes the best barometer for bad weather." The green in Anne's eyes winking at Ken like waves on the sea. "Do you suppose your sister still has our shoes and your sweater?" she asked Walter as he took her hand.

"So Di is here?" Ken said, feeling around in his jacket for Persis' letter.

"No. Rilla," Anne answered, fussing about with Walter's collar. "Walter are you cold, would you like my shawl? It's fairly plain, no one would know-"

Her son shook his head as vigorously as any twenty year old might at such a suggestion. "I'm fine! We'll find Rilla. Dog Monday's not so spry as he once was, if she has wandered away it won't be far. If you should see her, Ken..."

They said their goodbyes and Ken watched the pair head back toward the higgledy collection of houses and boats that made up Over-Harbour. He nestled into the sand but somehow Persis's letter found its way back into his pocket again and he stared into the sea.

She was here.

Ken sat watching the sky fling itself at the sea until the pounding in his chest outdid the waves on the shore and he started to walk toward his cousin's house. The fine mist that fell became heavier and he headed to a clump of pines that grew where white sand gave way to red earth. Ken leaned against a weathered trunk preferring to wait out the shower under a tree than risk another close call with Ethel Reese. He began a third attempt to read his sister's letter when he saw a flash of white, a foot, a hand, and a little wet dog scampering through the spindly trees that grew closest to the beach front.

It was Rilla. And worse, it was what his heart did when it was Rilla. Accelerating wildly as though it gulped for blood the way his mouth gulped for air. He shrank back, unable to move, unable to stop himself peering through the trees in hope of another glance at her. Since that day in July Ken had only allowed himself the barest moments in her company, a nod at church, a wave if he saw her on a common road, then he would turn away. This was made easier by the fact she was clearly annoyed at him. Rilla did not forgive him his little snub and was quite satisifed to maintain the distinction of being horribly hurt by that caddish Toronto boy. Such a dedicated grudge certainly made things easier for him yet he did not feel the benefit. Her anger toward him only made him think of her more; made him regret his words and wish she would smile at him, instead of cock her brow so gorgeously and glare.

There had never been such an opportunity to gaze at her like this, and he drank her in the way sand drinks rain. She had pulled Walter's pale blue sweater over her white summer dress, her slender wrists poking out from fatly rolled up cuffs, and legs kicking up the spattered hem of her skirts. If her thoughts were on tomorrow's weather the expression on her face showed no hint of it.

Her damp hair stuck in lengths across her cheeks which the rain had painted softest pink. She was laughing and calling to the scruffy dog, tossing pine cones for to him to retrieve from the waves. Presently, Dog Monday caught the scent of something and wandered into the piney glade, Rilla following after a moment to shelter from the thickening drizzle. All at once her hand went to an invisible shoulder and another to an unseen hand and she was waltzing upon a pine needle carpet with a dreamy look in her wet lashed eyes. As her dog came sniffing at her toes Rilla scooped him up and danced him round the trees. She closed her eyes and rubbed her cheek against his muzzle, murmuring to him quietly.

"You'll dance with me, Monday, you'll dance with me, boy, even if no one else does."

Ken sucked his lip as he watched her, and smoothed back his damp hair. Monday grew tired of her circles and when she released him Ken decided he would go to her. He longed to see her face up close, dapple cheeked and wet skinned. Her eyes no longer dark with anger but glowing with a want he had glimpsed at once before.

It was no girlish welcome she had tried to give to him that afternoon at Ingleside. The look in her eyes -he could admit that now- was not intended for a playmate. Ken Ford knew enough about women to know _that_. Rilla's eyes asked Ken a question that dusk in July, and they asked it the following dawn. Asked him in the church and the ale house, by the hearth and by the sea. The answer burnt inside him yet he was terrified to speak.

He took a step toward her as a cold hand to a fire. He could almost feel the warmth of her skin beneath his fingers and he swayed now at the thought of his body moving with her, and against her. To hold her in his arms not as a boyhood chum but as a boy. Her boy, and she his Rilla.

Ken took another step and Dog Monday growled, because of him or something else he was uncertain. Rilla grabbed the bedraggled creature up into her arms again, then glanced in his direction. The fierce, bright challenge that flashed in her eyes at whoever or whatever was hiding from her was the last thing Kenneth Ford saw before she disappeared from his sight, out toward the shore.

She was gone.

And so was he. Gone, gone, gone on Rilla Blythe.

**… … …**

_Stolen poetry from "Fickle One" in The Captain's Verses by Pablo Neruda_

_Thank you for all reading so far, the dance at the Light is next._


	4. Hesitating Beauty

**Hesitating Beauty**

_In which Rilla Blythe causes a proper sensation, and Ken is overwhelmed by improper ones._

**_Hollyhocks, Over-Harbour ~the following evening_**

"You've not tied that right," Miriam West called out to her cousin as he attempted to set off for the evening. "Come here and let me fix it for you."

Ken stood with his hand on the door handle, the turning of which would enable his escape from another fussing woman. He looked over at his cousin as she left the front parlour, a long box of matches in her hand for the lighting of the lamps in that room.

"Here, take these," Mim said, with the air of one forever being called from important tasks so that the bow ties of useless young men might be straightened, and pressed the carton into his hand. "Whatever were you thinking of when you tied that thing?" she smirked, and went to work on the knot. "Anyone would think you were drunk! Did you break some bones in yer hands as well as yer foot? No need to think we don't have the same standards of neatness and decorum in Over-Harbour as they do in your big-"

Mim stopped and bit her tongue. Not because she felt she'd gone too far with her teasing but because she'd come to the fiddly part. Ken watched her bob about in the hallway mirror as a perfect black bow was made around his neck.

"There. That's better." She took the matches back from Ken and he pinched the black silk between his thumbs and fingers, nestling the tie against his collar.

"Much, thanks for that," he said, standing before his reflection. Looking, _staring_ even, Mim thought, as though he hardly recognised the man looking back. Whatever had come over the boy? He looked positively moony.

"Out the _front_ door this time, I see-"

"Well spotted, Miriam. I need to use it on order to leave the house."

"Ain't they all walking along the back way and rowing to the Light?"

She knew as well as he did that a large party of Over-Harbour youths were even now gathering along the shore behind their house. Mim could almost feel the keen stares of certain persons craning to see when Kenneth Ford would make his appearance.

"I asked Leo for the buggy. Ankle's playing up-"

"Why on earth you're going to a dance is beyond my comprehension!"

Ken was content to keep her puzzling and after a quick kiss by the curling hair that bloomed about her temples, shuffled toward Mim's nephew's place. He hitched the horse but did not head directly to the Light, veering the old mare toward Harbour Head and trotting for some distance along a ribbon of road that connected the shabby village to a bustling peninsula of boats and warehouses. Here Ken was afforded a fairytale view of the Lighthouse, its lamp yet a watery beam in the sunset, and watched as coloured paper globes were lit around a large pavilion. The Halifax Lewisons had it made _especially_ it was said, in the hushed and reverent tones of 'no expense spared'. Hosting a dance provided many a summering family the opportunity to impress their position and style upon the dear harbour folk. Where great wealth and the less tangible -though conceivably just as valuable- riches of Island life could be celebrated in one tasteful event.

In silhouette upon a coppery sheet of sea were boats being rowed with all the show of youthful competition to the Four Winds Point. The warm gulf breeze ruffled Ken's hair and his dinner jacket as he watched them, carrying the noise of boys and girls who sailed with expectant faces and excited hearts. Ken did not think, Is she there? He knew she was, knew it as surely as if there was a spyglass at his eye. He did not even think, Will she -if I ask her- will she dance with me? He knew with equal certainty she would, as all girls, especially those who hated the sight of him, would grasp his hand whenever he chose to offer it. He did not even think that he would turn back, though as Mim pointed out he had fair excuse. He only sat and meant to continue sitting, as though the thorough contemplation of how the bench-seat felt beneath his thighs, how the reins felt between his fingers were the only things between him and annihilation.

All things pertaining to Leo West's buggy were very much in Ken's thoughts as he tethered Smoky with the other horses and walked toward the Four Winds Lighthouse. He even found himself sniffing his hands in case the smell of old greasy leather left its imprint on his skin. His fingers felt icy as they brushed against his face and he rubbed them together impatiently, a tiny fear forming at the back of his mind that they might feel cold and clammy when he asked her to dance.

So_,_ it was not to be _if_ but _when_. Well of course when! There was no question now, never had been, that he would ask Rilla to dance. He would simply go up there and search her out among the nervous wallflowers. It would be rude not to, hadn't Mrs Blythe practically demanded it of him? He would dance with the kid just as he would dance with Nan and Di. He would be the teasing, watchful playmate he had always been. And imagined himself now, as he made his way carefully up the stone cut staircase that lead to the Light, scaring away the lanky youths that were steeling themselves to talk to her. He could already see the look that Rilla would give him, her brow cocked, her lips in a cross little pout. While he would laugh, as she always made him laugh.

There was not much to laugh at when he came to the top of the stairs. Little Rilla Blythe was being whirled around by some tall lad with a sun-browned face that went at once from deepest delight to darkest despair as another boy tapped his shoulder and begged Rilla for his partner. Ken had not been there a minute before he had seen her in the in the arms of three such boys, and a brief glance around the edges of the dance floor showed many more meant to have the pleasure of her company before the night ended.

Faces all seemed focussed on Rilla, though the girls could not be said to bear the same rapt expression. She was rather too beautiful, too radiantly happy, to elicit the same pleasure from them. Instead they looked as though they tried to find fault, as if one could blame a rose for smelling too sweet, or a sunset for glowing too pink. Ken stared at Rilla too, as lost as any of those boys he had smugly imagined fending off, and with an envy equal if not in substance then at least in strength to any of the girls.

Rilla floated among them without a care for their wide eyed gazes and their narrow eyed glares, or any show that she had noticed Kenneth Ford arrive at all. Others had been more observant. One sidled up against him now with a conspiratorial cosiness that came of hearing all about Ken and Rilla's mutual loathing.

"Would you look at Rilla Blythe?"

Ken did not need to be told. He managed a small glance at Ethel Reese's nose before resuming his gaze at the girl in question.

"Hardly proper letting a _child_ come to a dance. But then the Blythes always did think themselves above the rules. Look at her fizzing about with that silly smile on her face. I almost feel embarrassed for her."

"You're not dancing." Ken was careful to make his words sound like a statement than an invitation, but Ethel made of it what she could.

"You goose! Don't you go dragging me onto the floor when you've a bad ankle. How is it by the way?"

"Much the same as when you asked me last night."

"Poor Ken, how tiresome having to make an appearance at such a modest affair. Look at this hokey dance floor -roofed in _fir boughs_ of all things, as though we Islanders didn't expect any better. And that fiddler! Didn't the Lewisons know ol' Ned can play nothing but jigs and reels. What a pity we cannot show them how it's _really_ done, Ken. I don't suppose you could manage a slow waltz -perhaps, if I had a word in Mrs Lewison's ear..?" Her offer was met with such a silence Ethel was compelled to continue. "I suppose it was those Blythes that made you come. Just like them to be always thinking of pleasure first."

"Mmm, the Blythes are a real riot."

Again, Ethel was left wondering what it was he really meant. If only he would take his eyes off that green-dressed ninny twirling in front of him she might secure his attentions. When Ken lifted himself upon the railings that had been built to stop the party dancing into the sea, clever Miss Reese saw her chance.

"Oh, dear! Oh, look -oh, no _don't_ look, Ken! Poor Rilla! Will _no one_ tell her? Where are all the Blythes now? Off making sheep's eyes at the Merediths, no doubt, while their little sister is _humiliated_ before all-"

"What's up?" Ken asked her. After managing the precarious task of balancing himself on the top of the rail he did not mean to come down again without sufficient cause.

"Oh... well, I mustn't say. _Not_ to a gentleman. Except that Rilla is in danger of exposing herself. Her dress... all the buttons must have popped off the back-"

"I should get over there-" Ken said, motioning to climb down.

"No!" Ethel yelped. She had meant to remove that ruddy haired snippet from his notice, not coax them closer together. "Let me, Ken. It is for a _woman _to tell her, it would only embarrass her more if _you_ were to say something. Laws, there is some sort of stain on it too, did you see? Looks like the poor girl's night is fairly over now. Unlucky little duck," she said, with a feeling verging on pity, as she pictured Rilla leaving the Light in hot-faced disgrace. "She was having such a nice time, too." And Ethel pressed into the heave of dancers with a haste that showed she rather relished the task of ruining it for her .

Ken did not see their conversation, only Rilla's figure racing back toward the Lighthouse, her long, pale arms clutching the back of her skirts. If such a hole or stain existed it was nothing her small hands couldn't cover with ease, and Ken suspected Ethel might have overstated the damage. In any case Rilla would certainly go home now, her girlish embarrassment was bound to be too large a thing to be gotten over so quickly. Ken did not know if he was annoyed or relieved, though all interest in this little spree had waned to nothing now Rilla had gone. He slid down from his perch and began the awkward jostle back to the stone steps when he was hooked once again.

"Kenneth Ford, fashionably late I see," Hazel Lewison exclaimed, a saucy look in her her kohl rimmed eyes. "We've missed you dreadfully on _this_ side of the Gulf. Poor you, having to slum it in Over-Harbour all summer. Ethel Reese would have it that it's all on her account, you know. Fancy a little bumpkin like her wearing a colour like that!" Hazel added, as though the Lewisons had exclusive right to the wearing of red. "She's gone to scare up a waltz from the violinist Mother hired. What a joke if you should ask _me_ instead!"

Ken turned and spied by Hazel's scarlet silk shoulder a view of Rilla descending the stairs, tripping lightly and confidently not to the exit as he had expected, but back toward the dance. She was neither flushed nor ruffled, in truth she looked more beautiful than ever. It seemed Ethel's barbs had no effect, and he smiled with no small admiration and much to Hazel's delight.

"Sorry Nutkin, gotta scoot-" Ken said, all thoughts on securing the girl in the green dress for the first slow dance of the evening. If he would do it he would do it now -oh, would these people not clear the way? He strained to follow her through the crowd, wary some other lad might nab her at any moment.

The sickening jolt inside Miss Lewison went right to her toes, even though Mr Ford had not as she had first feared, passed her over for the girl who had dared,_ dared,_ wear Hazel's signature colour, as she watched him make his way to someone altogether much worse. Of course it _would_ be a Blythe. If there was any prize to be had on this little rock the Blythes were sure to win it. Though it was not to the uncommonly pretty Nan or her vivacious sister, Di, Ken walked towards now, but to the littlest sister! The gangly, freckly one who still wore her dresses short and her hair long. She couldn't even be out yet -Hazel wasn't even sure of her name.

Rilla was looking at him. Was she looking at him? Just when Ken thought he had caught her eye, she would lower her lashes and gaze at the floor. He begged pardon for the third time when he felt her eyes upon him again and saw a look of recognition, before she turned away. Ned Burr began to tune his instrument for the Hesitation and the floor began to clear. Yet Rilla remained where she was, waiting for Ken to come to her.

Those last two steps seemed miles long and when he reached her his heart pounded as though he had run the distance. The green of Rilla's skirts pressing into the black of his trousers. Ken had not been this close to her since that dusky afternoon when he had looked up at her and saw _that_ look -the same look she was giving him now.

Rilla placed her hands in front of her and his gaze travelled up her arms capped in gauzy puffs, noticing how her hair was pulled back in a softly woven knot which accentuated the creamy skin of her shoulders and throat. The seed pearls on her lobes bobbed about as she moved from one silver shod foot to the other and her dress brushed over his legs. The opening bars of the Hesitation waltz rang through the pavilion. Yet still she stood, as others whirled about and whispered, allowing this strange silence to exist between them. Ken swallowed hard, willing himself to speak. He wanted her, all of her, if only she would look at him again.

"Is this Rilla-my-Rilla?" he asked her, his cheeks reddening at the unintended emphasis of the _my _in his greeting. They all but ignited as Rilla Blythe looked straight into his eyes and answered with gorgeous candour that she was. She did not play with him, neither did she eagerly seek his approval. She simply looked down at her shoes again, as though in this there was nothing left it be said. Ken was transfixed, and when he asked her to dance she replied in such a way as to make him feel the fool for having to ask.

Her hand was in his and he stepped back awkwardly, cursing his ankle anew. Ken had meant to show his mastery and elegance and began to fear he might not manage more than a clumsy shuffle. He found himself mentioning it now, the very injury he was so bored with being asked about that he had threatened to wear a placard around his neck declaring the foot's condition. Yet when the girl in his arms made her own polite inquiries it did not seem dull at all but sweetly reassuring.

Rilla stared hard at her hand resting lightly on Ken's shoulder. To peer over it would be to notice all those people watching them, yet to gaze upwards seemed equally impossible. She hadn't realised before how tall Ken was, how she would have to stretch her neck and point her chin in order to see his face. This might have been remedied had her partner held her loosely, she could have moved back and been able to look at him with more ease. But Ken pulled her into him and held her so close she could feel his breath though the flowers in her hair when he spoke. It was only of common little things but the flutter it caused went straight through her.

And the smell of him! It had never occurred to her that Ken Ford would have his own particular smell. He was so different to her brothers and her father. They always seemed so crisp and leafy. Ken was altogether different; woody, sharp and resinous as pine sap. She grasped his shoulder -how broad it was, what a lot to hold onto- and wished she might stay in his arms forever. Willing away any other boy who might interrupt them and rob her of this bliss.

Ken was having similar thoughts. As the bittersweet melody concluded he knew this small, perfect moment between them must end and he would have to watch Rilla walk away and into the arms of someone else. He pressed his hand firmly about her waist, savouring the feel of her warm body. There was nothing frail about her, she felt long and lithe, like her smooth white throat which she tilted toward him when she spoke.

"Thank you, Ken," she murmured, peering up at him through her eyelashes. She took her hand from his shoulder but noticed he kept her other hand firmly in his.

"Come with me?" he asked her, and when she beamed in reply he tucked her arm about his and made for the cut stone stairs. They wove among the boys without partners and the girls with pinched toes who rested on the rocks. It was not long before they were at the dock, where flats and dories lined up like fish on a line.

"Pick one," Ken said, motioning at the boats that bobbled on the water.

"Are you taking me home?" Rilla asked.

"What- no. Not at all. In fact far from it."

She smiled at him, it was the smile of a child, full of mirth and mischief. "Well... in that case I choose the yellow flat!"

Ken helped her into her seat and then eased the boat from its mooring. After a few swift strokes he lifted the oars out of the water, lying them on the edge of the boat so that he could remove his jacket.

"Would you mind, Rilla?" he asked her. She took it from him and pressed it into her lap. It still bore the scent and warmth she had thrilled at when they danced, Ken bit back a smile as she stroked the fabric as though it was a cat.

Rilla was only too glad to have something to turn her attention to. All else was in darkness, save the long bridge of light that beamed over the water. There was nothing else to look at but the handsome young man in his white shirt working the oars, so she fussed with his jacket instead.

"It's very nice."

"Beautiful," Ken said.

"I suppose to a man it would be."

"That's funny, I would have thought the admiration of scenery very much the province of the female sex."

Rilla looked up, startled by such a bold phrase, and saw Ken too had a look of puzzlement on his face. They held each other's gaze for some moments. The stroke of the oars like the pulse of the waltz, their world made of the two of them and nothing else. It was Ken who broke away first, looking out for the long arm of white sand that beckoned their boat, and Rilla erupted in giggles.

"I was talking of your jacket, Ken. Your jacket is _very nice! _Not that the scenery isn't, of course. Only I've had lots of opportunities to appreciate the scenery-"

"But not so many holding a man's jacket."

The way he called himself a man, the way he stared at her when he said it. Rilla carefully traced her finger around the lip of each shiny black button until the blush on her cheek had cooled.

"Not so many, but enough... Remember, you and Jem would get me to hold your clothes, then make me sit with my back to the pond while you went swimming?"

It was Ken's turn to blush. "You were always a good kid."

"Do you think I'm still a good kid?"

There was no possibility of Ken answering that, fortunately geography interrupted. "Shall we land here for a tick or would you rather turn back?"

Rilla tore her eyes from Ken and noticed the sandbar behind him, glowing as whitely as his shirt.

"Oh, let's go ashore, Ken! That is if..." she was loathe to mention his ankle again, she looked down at her own feet and hoped her little silver slippers could manage the ramble.

"Swell! What say in the spirit of those days at the pond we leave our shoes here?"

"Agreed!" Rilla said with some relief, thinking of how blissful the cool sand would feel on her sore feet. Unfortunately they looked as bad as they felt. There was no way Kenneth Ford was going to get a look at such a blistered mess, and she squeezed her shoes on again. Ken took his time, unwrapping a length of gauze from his foot, all the while thinking what a brilliant girl was Rilla Blythe. So direct, so adventurous, so overwhelmingly lovely.

She disembarked from the flat with the expert leap of an Island girl and skipped along the sand. Ken watched her intently as she moved along the shore then reached for the dinner-jacket that lay on her seat. He was used to seeing Rilla's hair worn long over her shoulders and was breathless at the sight of the moonlight on her bare skin. A desire to hold her in his arms again, to kiss every place the moonlight touched her, burst within him. He yanked at his jacket and buttoned it up with a rough impatience. What a fool he was. A fool in a bespoke dinner suit and bare feet.

"Come _on_!" Rilla called. Then in a sudden change of heart came running back to the boat and held her hand out to him. "I was forgetting," she grinned, "you might need some help yourself."

Ken grasped her hand gratefully and as they touched saw unmistakeable excitement in her eyes. He looked away to the deepening sky above, to the long white path ahead, but saw nothing else. Just the dark and the light. Just the two of them. Only heaven could help him now.

**… … …**

_Thank you for reading :o)_**  
><strong>


	5. Call to Arms

_With love and gratitude to L.M.M -everything is hers, only this idea is mine_

**Call to Arms**

_In which Ken and Rilla discuss poetry, fashion, toys and shoes... anything except what they are really thinking._

_**Four Winds Point; August 4th 1914**_

"You changed your mind."

"I did?" said Rilla.

She dropped Kenneth's hand in confusion and he took the opportunity to pull the boat further up the sandbank, yanking at it as though expecting high tide.

"Your shoes," he said, brushing his hands against his thighs.

The two of them peered at the glittering slippers on Rilla's feet as though neither had seen such a thing before.

"Oh! Yes, well... I was forgetting myself -as well as you it seems. Only little children go about barefoot and I'm not a child anymore," she told him, with all the ladylike grace she thought befit the situation.

Ken looked at his own feet which were as white and bare as the sand they stood on.

"Oh no, please don't take me to mean that you should-" Rilla began to blush. Silly, irrelevant girl, why did everything that came out of her mouth sound like nonsense of the highest order? Was there even such a thing? Surely nonsense was _disordered_, it would hardly count as nonsense otherwise. The clue was in the word itself. Though why she should be thinking of this right now_ ..._on a moonlit beach ...with Kenneth Ford!

"-take some years off me," Ken was saying, "and our ages will meet somewhere in the middle."

"Mmmm," Rilla murmured. It was on the tip of her tongue to mention that ankle _again_. How unfair that everyone else was so unimaginative that she should have to censor herself from the same remark.

Well that joke got the reaction it deserved, Ken thought. Of all the times to bring up their age difference he had to do it now, on a deserted shore. If he didn't take more care she would begin to worry about his intentions. And what were they exactly, Ken asked himself as he offered his arm to her. To be with Rilla was to be constantly pulled in by desire, only to draw back in fear. He was no better than the waves that rushed at their feet and retreated again. The same waves that Rilla listened to intently, trying to calm the wild beats in her chest by breathing in time with the tide.

Ken looked down at her and she peeped up briefly. It was usually about this time that a young lady on the arm of Ken Ford would ask him what kept him so quiet -or worse, what he was thinking about. To his relief and not some wonder Rilla did not. They carried on wordlessly until they reached the place where he had sat with Walter and Mrs Blythe the previous afternoon. It was a favourite spot and for want of something to say he asked if they might rest there for a moment.

They sat down together but the closeness they found in the crowded pavilion seemed impossible now they were alone. Her pale green skirts splayed prettily across the sand, and this time Ken took a great deal of care that he shouldn't come up against one sprig of the pale pink garlands printed on the green fabric.

"I was here yesterday," he said. He had been unsure whether he should mention this or not, but was even more weary of all the second guessing he was putting himself through. This was Rilla Blythe, after all. It was not so long ago that she had ridden him like a white steed across the green of Rainbow Valley.

"I know," Rilla replied, tucking a curl behind her ear.

"You do?"

"Mother mentioned it. She asked if I had seen you."

This question had been put to her not long after Anne had demanded to know where on earth she had been? Because of her Walter had to walk home in the rain without his sweater. Rilla declared feeling equally put upon having to trudge back to Ingleside with _all _their shoes. However none of this needed mentioning right at this moment.

"What did you say?" Ken asked.

"That I hadn't, of course."

"No. Of course," Ken replied. It was he who had seen altogether too much of her, bare legged and dewy faced... He began to pick at the tussock that billowed near his elbow. "Remember making those little straw horses?"

Remember? Rilla still had the little set; the father, the mother, and the tiny foal tucked in the little wooden box that was their stable. "Oh, yes," she said, as though she'd only just recalled he'd ever made her such a thing.

They began a game of 'do you remember', both entering into it with the over-enthusiasm of two people who did not, could not, talk of the here and now. When all their favourite recollections had been laughed at and sighed over Rilla was hugging at her knees with her skirts tucked tightly around her, and Ken began tracing his finger along the tiny rose wreaths on the hem of her dress.

"Beautiful."

"Are we talking about our clothes again or the scenery?"

She was resting her chin upon her knees as many a Blythe girl had been known to do. And then tilted her face toward him with a look in her eyes that was all Rilla.

"Your dress, of course!" Ken exclaimed, a little too heartily. He dropped her skirt and leaned back on his arms so that Rilla's face was hidden by her hair. "Your Mother told me how hard you worked on it."

"It's true. I did. But not for any _grand _reason, not like Persis. I didn't design it, didn't even pick the fabric. Sorry to be a bore, I don't expect you to pity the trials of such a spoiled little brat as myself, but I am bound to tell you that I only worked so hard upon it because that's what people do at Ingleside. They all have such grand passions for things. If there aren't enough hours in the day then there's something wrong with you-"

"There's nothing wrong with you-"

"Oh, but there is. I am a complete and utter dunce, you know. And even worse... I don't even care. Well, only so much as it bothers Mother and Father. But as for me..."

Rilla went quiet again. She tucked her dress about her so completely there was not toe to be seen. The two of them sat and watched the waves wash the shore, rippling back and forth like lace at an open window.

After a time Ken said, "I know what you mean."

"About what?"

"About what you were saying before. There are too many hours in my day, too. I don't suppose you'd give me such a sympathetic ear either when a man may do so much more than a woman -I said _may_ do, not _can_ do!" he laughed, when he saw the appalled look on Rilla's face, "I only meant I haven't the excuse you have. I could do anything, there is no one to stop me, and a hundred people who would gladly smooth my path ahead. But if anything that makes it worse... I want to make my _own_ path-"

"Your own path?" Rilla wasn't sure she quite understood -well that was a dunce for you. But she had noticed that if you repeated the last line that someone said it seemed to do the trick.

"Exactly." Ken smiled and shifted himself forward, the chestnut curl had fallen by Rilla's cheek again and he went to pull it back before remembering himself. "It's hard to live with someone else's idea of who you should be."

"Like when people still treat you like a child even though you're practically grown up."

"I was wondering when you would mention that. I am sorry, Rilla."

"Good," was all she said.

She meant it, too. It was good, it was all so very good. She smiled at him and it was open and generous and beautiful, there was just that curl that snagged so slightly on her lashes. His hand went up to her face, tracing along her eyebrow to move the tendril away.

"Shall we continue?" Ken asked.

_Continue! _Oh, was she to be nothing more than a little echo? It was only that she was even more wildly uncertain what he meant than ever before. Continue? Continue to sit? To walk? To caress her face in that inexpressible way so that even now she could feel his touch upon her skin?

"I would like to Ken, if you would ...if you're sure," she managed to say.

"Very," he said.

Evidently Ken had been asking if she had wanted to keep walking with him because he suddenly stood up, and Rilla hastily tried to slip her feet back into her shoes. She had pried them out whilst they were hidden under her skirts and buried her toes in the cool white sand. Now she endeavoured to wriggle into them again as Ken looked on with his hand outstretched waiting to help her up. How very odd she must have appeared to him, she thought, quickly followed by how wonderful his hand felt in hers, how large and smooth and strong. It brought about such a feeling inside her she could now see why it might be quite the scandal after all, to be caught holding hands with a boy. Not that Ken was a boy, of course...

"We'll be back at Hollyhocks before we know it!" he announced, with an unexpected enthusiasm.

He wouldn't invite her in to tea with the Wests would he? Rilla would have rather rowed back alone than be winked at by Miriam West. She couldn't have borne the little looks and smirks she should be given, as though Rilla could be lumped in with all the other flirts who tried to _catch_ Kenneth Ford, as Mrs West was fond of saying.

"It must be nice being so close to the shore," Rilla said, hoping that if she reminded him of its charm he would want to remain there, instead of making his way to the West's hideously papered parlour.

"It is," Ken replied, not in the least inclined to take a detour to his cousin's house. "Although I was a little annoyed at first." He had been more than that, he had been exceedingly scornful of the suggestion that he summer with the tart tongued, beady eyed wife of Martin West. Yet he came to find himself not just tolerating but enjoying her teasing, boisterous ways. She was so different to his mother and he could better understand how a family like the Blythes would be lost without their Susan. "I didn't imagine I would stay as long as I have-"

"But you've only been here a month- we've hardly seen you as it is, what with your- I hope you don't mean to go soon-"

Why didn't she just propose to him on the spot? He couldn't be in any doubt of her feelings now! Oh how was it done, this fraught business? She would never mock at Nan and Jem again.

"Not at all," Ken answered lightly. "Miriam West is an utter brick. She puts me in my place... and I dare say I deserve it."

"And what is _your place?_"

The question hit him like a vicious gust the Gulf could suddenly hurl at you on a blue skied Island day.

"Exactly, Rilla. I hate living with this feeling, that I have had every advantage and yet haven't been able to make something of it."

"Who says you need to?" asked the girl whose proudest accomplishment so far had been obtaining permission to come to this dance tonight .

"Indeed. It's that bally Piper's fault, isn't it? The one your genius of a brother keeps on about. Signalling the call, pointing us to our higher purpose. And we're all supposed to follow blindly-"

"Not blindly!" Rilla exclaimed. She had an uncomfortable feeling that perhaps Ken was angry at Walter, and a strong and loyal need to protect her brother rose up inside her.

"No-" Ken said quickly, "of course not blindly, Rilla. I only meant that sometimes a fellow might wonder if he has followed the wrong path."

"Oh, you shall have your chance to make it right, again. If I know anything then at least I know _that_!" Rilla smiled, filled with a happiness now the conversation had returned to surer ground. She may have been a little fool but she was also a daughter of Anne. "As Mother says, there's always a bend in the road_."_ A delicious pang went through her as she spoke. Was it her imagination or did Kenneth Ford give her hand a fleeting yet tender squeeze?

Their talk was interrupted by the crunch of their feet on the needles and twigs a clump of pine-trees had shed upon the sand. Beyond these trees the hedge of Hollyhocks reared up -as would the eyebrows of the Mrs West should she catch sight of the two of them.

"Looks like we've come to ours, Rilla-my-Rilla. We should go back or we'll miss supper at the Light as well."

The hours it seemed to take to get to one end of the sandbar fell away in minutes on their return. The yellow flat sat waiting for them, and soon Rilla and Ken sat within her. Eyes upon the oars, the waves, the sky, anywhere but on each other. A thin sound of music was carried on the air as they rowed to shore, air that was crisper and cooler than before. Rilla shivered lightly and rubbed her arms and soon Ken's jacket found its way around her. The size of it seemed to engulf her, it felt exotic and angular, more than that, almost shocking, the way the silken lining kissed her bare skin.

"Please take it back," said Rilla shyly, as Ken tethered the boat to the dock once more, "it's not so cold as it was on the open water."

Ken slid it from her shoulders and shuffled it over his own. It sat upon him uneasily though it had been tailored to fit his every inch, as if it was not the jacket he could feel about him but Rilla. He was still tugging and fussing with it as they climbed the stone staircase to the pavilion. Ned Burr had forsaken his fiddle for the smaller comforts of his pipe, and erstwhile dancers in couples and in threes sat upon the railing, sipping punch and fixing their supper onto their forks.

They entered the Lighthouse kitchen, a room once warm and cosy now alien and strange. Was it another world, or had they just come from one? Surely there was no going back to such everyday, inconsequential things like lemon cake and sherbet ice. Rilla put the smallest crumb to her lips but could barely swallow it, every part of her aware of the way her elbow brushed against Ken's leg as he sat on the thick window ledge behind her. The stone felt cool as he leaned against it and when his arm drifted down he could feel the thick knot of Rilla's hair press into the back of his hand. Presently she turned her head and a bloom loosened from the pretty twists at her nape. Ken caught it in his palm and cradled it like a flame.

An exquisite tension coiled around them both, so that even though they neither spoke nor sat directly by each other anyone who saw them knew and understood that Rilla Blythe and Kenneth Ford were most definitely _together_. Bound in an intimacy so electric that every tiny movement was a message to the other, yet so tenuous it might be snapped at any moment. It was nothing so flimsy as a page of newsprint that undid them. Clutched in the trembling hand of a serious young man who stalked into the kitchen, his eyes dark and lips pale.

"England has declared war on Germany..."

An eruption of noise rushed through the room. An awful, frightening racket as though they stood too close to the platform's edge while a great train hurtled past. Ken was sickened, excited and anxious all at once, feeling both alive to possibility and never so close to death. The whole of the Lighthouse kitchen rattled with the word, _war, war, war, war,_ like pistons of a hulking black engine that would carry them all away.

Ken had a sudden image of himself struggling to catch that train, hobbling after it desperately, as Jem and Jerry and every other Canadian boy waved at him with a jeering pity and left him behind. It was the cruelest blow to have a purpose, a reason, a chance for honour and adventure dangled in front of him and be denied it. Blast his ankle! Blast the school-boyish vanity that had been the cause of it! Blast every moment he had railed against it until now! _Now_ when it really mattered. What were strolls and dances and football games compared with this?

The chatter in the kitchen began to fade, those who remained having lost interest in such news. For what did the politics of dusty old Europe matter when there was cherry pie to devour and the blatant way Minette Lewis snubbed Dunstan Cole to discuss? Even Ned had been prevailed upon to give them another jig. The serious pontificators had taken themselves away from the party. Ken itched to follow them and would have too, if not for the lass perched unhappily beneath him.

He touched his hand upon Rilla's shoulder and she looked up slowly, the gold in her eyes mere flickers of what they had been moments before. Her pale oval face staring up at him expectantly, waiting for Ken to make sense of it all. A blur of words passed between them, a fraught exchange that showed nothing so much as how little they knew each other. He might try to be gentle, she might try to be wise, but he was too overwhelmed and she too uncomprehending. It was another gulf they stared at now, with Ken on one side and Rilla on the other.

Ken was appalled and relieved. To think she might have tied herself to him, to think he had wanted her to. A young girl of bright and perfect promise to be made to wait -for _him_. What expectation, what possessiveness, when he had selfishly called her Rilla-_my_-Rilla. There could be no thought of that now.

Rilla must have thought so, too. A young lad approached her nervously and asked her for a dance. Ken watched her as she took the boy's hand without a word and slowly walked away from him. His eyes never left the form of the beautiful girl in the pale green dress, but she never looked back. He blew the golden blossom from his palm as though snuffing out a light, and went looking for war.

**… … …**

_At this point Germany had invaded Belgium. Belgium had asked England to come to its aid, but to do so would be seen as an open act of war against Germany. As Canada was at this time a dominion (former colony) of England it was expected to support England's war effort; so England's war is effectively Canada's war._

_Thank you so much for reading. I hope you are coming to love or at least understand Kenneth Ford a little better. In the next chapter we are back with the Blythes and Merediths, as they try to come to terms with the effect the war will have on their lives (and their loves)_


	6. Fall Out

**Fall Out**

_In which Jem loses faith in Walter; Walter loses faith in himself; Ken feels lost; and everyone loses Rilla completely._

_**The Harbour Road, Four Winds ~later that same night**_

The dory clattered into the dock, thumping against sea-greyed posts as those within began to clamber unsteadily ashore.

"Wait on-" Walter called, as Jem leaped out of the boat.

"Not now!" his brother hissed, shaking off the hand that tried to stay him. He dashed over to two other passengers who had lost no time getting themselves onto dry land -a moonlit jaunt across the Harbour it had _not_ been. "So long then, Joe! Miranda!" Jem called out, heartily, though more from good form than good feeling.

"G-good night" the two stammered back before scampering away in the manner of rodents and sinking ships.

Faith took hold of Walter's hand as she disembarked and went swiftly to Jem's side. She was just as eager as pale-faced Miss Pryor to link arms with her favourite, not only because it was her habit but because she felt uneasy herself. Jem had rowed them all back from the Light House at such a rate that everyone went silent at the sight of it. Something was not right and she was not the only one to notice, Joe and Miranda had seemed almost relieved to get away. Of course, it was a rare opportunity for those poor thwarted lovers to have a long stroll home to look forward to. Josiah Pryor was very particular over who had the privilege of walking his daughter home, and young Milgrave did not fulfil even one requirement of the old man's pompous and lengthy criteria.

"Whiskers-on-the-Moon is going to skin you alive for letting Joe escort his daughter home!" Faith grinned, giving Jem an affectionate squeeze. She hoped to make him laugh. Instead she felt his body bristling under her fingertips.

"I never thought there'd come a day when I would say this, but right now I have a good idea how ol' Pryor feels." Faith noticed that although Jem addressed her he was looking at his brother. "Perhaps you're right, Faith, perhaps I should call Joe back and then Walter can walk Miranda home instead. I'm sure he would be considered a far more suitable choice of husband for Miss Pryor. He and Moony already have such a lot in common-"

"I'm no pacifist, Jem," Walter said, over Faith's shoulder.

"Indeed. Shall we, Miss Meredith?" Jem asked, tugging at her arm.

"What is going on?" Faith said. She felt Walter's hand at her shoulder attempting a reassuring squeeze before he entreated Jem once more.

"Jem listen to me-"

Jem's eyes flicked over them both before fixing his brother with a piercing stare. The same stare he had endured from a snickering crowd who had watched with gaping mouths as Walter Blythe announced his bleak-hearted premonitions about the war.

It should have been a momentous occasion in all their lives. A date that all would look back on and say 'I was there the day the world went to war_._' To know that Canada would go into battle and that he, Jem Blythe from her tiniest Isle, would have a part to play. But there was little back-slapping and no flag hoisting. If anyone was to remember anything about this night then it would be the dark, unwanted words of his brother that would stick horribly in their memory.

"_Listen_ to you?" Jem erupted, "That's all we've been doing from the moment the news came. Listening to Walter Blythe's grand pronunciations... How could you, Walter?"

"I never meant-"

"Jem, please," Faith cut in, "You know it's just Walter's way-"

"Why do you _always_ take his part?"

"You are being unreasonable," she uttered, amazed to be saying those words to him.

"_I'm_ unreasonable?" This was too much. Now Faith -_his _Faith_-_ was acting as though it was Walter who had been in the right. "What about _him?_" Jem demanded, "No sooner is war declared then he starts in with his dire predictions about how Canada is about to enter a -a dance of death! That a million hearts will break! That we will all cry tears of blood before the end_... _For God's sake!"

"Steady on, Jem!" Jerry exclaimed. Having been left to tie the boat up he had come late to the conversation and did not like the little that he saw now. Especially his sister's part in it, shiny eyed, upset, and placed squarely between the two Blythe brothers.

"Sorry, old man," Jem shrugged. "We should go." He took a few steps along the Harbour Road then turned abruptly. "Faith, did you still want me to accompany you home?"

"I think you owe Faith an apology, first."

"I owe -_I_ owe?" Now Walter was _speaking_ for her as well! "What about _you?_" Jem spat, "Your words upset lot of people at the dance."

"War _is _upsetting!" Walter cried.

"For you, you mean."

"Jem-" Faith gasped, a cold dread bolting through her that this had nothing to do with the war, at least not the war against Germany. She glanced across at Jerry who was staring very decidedly at the ground, while the other two locked eyes as though they locked horns. "What on earth has come over you?"

Only her pleas could have made him break his gaze. If he could only ignore the question of who she was pleading for. He turned toward her and shuddered when Faith took the tiniest step away from him.

"I could ask you the same thing," Jem said, hotly." You told _me_ you wished you could go into battle against the Hun yourself."

"Not everyone feels that way-"

"Who besides Walter?"

"Isn't Walter enough?" Faith asked him, holding out her hand to him.

"And I'm not?" Jem retorted. He turned around and stalked off alone. Faith could only watch him, unable to make her legs move -she who could never sit in a chair for two minutes together.

Jerry pulled his sister to him and lay his arm around her. He had been dumbfounded at the scene he had witnessed, and then swiftly shamed to see his own dark thoughts play out in front of him. There was perhaps nothing he could say to his friend. Jerry knew that if his own feelings had been so exposed he would not be in the listening mood. Yet Jem might take some comfort knowing how well he understood him.

"Maybe Walter should take you home, Faith. Let me have a word with Jem."

Faith yanked herself away to refuse his suggestion, then saw the look on Jerry's face and knew utterly the only person Jem might tolerate now would be her brother. She made a small nod and watched him walk away. Unexpectedly, he turned back and took her hands in his.

"If Father has yet to hear the news -about England -about the war... would you, if you can help it, Faith -would you not say anything until I come home? This will upset them greatly." He kissed the gold-brown hair that swept over her forehead and set off down the Harbour Road.

It wasn't until Jerry disappeared from view that Faith could bring herself to think of Walter again. He was leaning against the sturdy stone barrier that had been built before a steep drop into the Harbour. His face an unreadable silhouette, the hair he always raffishly raked back, drooping over his eyes. She walked up to him but he seemed to find the ground beneath him as interesting as she and Jerry had. Her hands touched upon the flat stones that topped the old wall and she worried out a brittle piece of mortar and cast it into the water below.

"Walter, I... What say we don't go back to the Manse yet? I don't think I could keep all..._ this_ to myself."

Walter looked at her, a wry half-smile on his lips. "It's not likely you'll have to, Faith. Do you not see the telephone wires alive with the news?" He gestured to the posts that stood sentry on the other side of the road, the thick black cord that linked them undulating like the waves of another kind of sea.

"I'm afraid that I don't," Faith replied, "I never had that knack-"

"Of seeing things that weren't there?"

"No, I... I didn't mean that exactly-"

"Be glad that you don't."

She gave him a friendly nudge with her shoulder. "Oh, I don't know. I could have spared myself a few scrapes if I had such an ability as yours. An imagination can't hurt you... the way the real world can."

He was relieved his hair fell over his eyes, they ached with tears he could no longer hold back. There were no unimagined horrors for Walter Blythe. Every horror, each unspeakable pain lived within him; a rare yet unholy burden that was his alone to bear. Tonight it had fallen upon him with its full force and it was all Walter could do not to scream to the skies. He saw and he felt with a heartbreaking clarity just what this war would do to them. And take from them. He had always lived with this, knowing each passing day lead them closer to that door in the mountainside and the terror that lived behind it. Tonight it was as if the door was flung open and he was made to stand and watch as his friends, his brothers, smiled and sang of the magnificent view within.

He wiped his eyes roughly and combed back his hair with his fingers. Faith stood quietly holding out her handkerchief. After a moment he grabbed it and dabbed at his cheeks, before noticing the monogram spelling out in Susan-made stitches, J.M.B. He pressed his nose into it and gave a terrific honk.

Faith nudged him again. "Help me up, won't you? My feet are killing me."

Walter stuffed the handkerchief into the pocket of his jacket, grasping Faith quickly and lifting her onto the wall. "Faith Meredith, can't even climb a little wall anymore."

"It's these shoes! You men wouldn't understand. How I envy you sometimes."

Walter hoisted himself up next to her and looked over his shoulder at the Harbour below. "Would you really go, Faith? If you could, would you really go to war?"

There was something in his voice that made Faith want to give a different answer, a tender gentleness that she felt loathe to harm or disappoint. But to lie to him, to tell him what he wanted to hear would be to mistake that gentleness for weakness, and Faith was not about to make that mistake.

"Yes, Walter I would. I would go. And gladly."

There it was. That fiery glow that had seemed to go out of her now kindled bright once more. Walter knew who she was thinking of.

"And you'll let Jem go just as gladly?"

"I would be more glad if I could go with him," she replied, "I would be very glad if I could fight by his side." Her legs began to swing and toss her dark green skirts about. "It never was within me to sit by the fire and wait. Much better to do something than nothing."

"We can agree there, at least," Walter said.

"We can agree on _most_ things, I think Walter." She had meant to be funny but somehow it had all become serious again. They endured another silence, Faith sliding her fingers between the stones where the mortar had worn away, Walter watching as Faith's kicking legs slowly came to a halt. "You have always been dear to me."

The careful way she spoke made him want to leap from the wall and into the sea. "The way Bruce is dear to Jem?" he muttered.

"If you like."

"And if I don't like?" Walter dug his hands into his pockets and flinched against Jem's balled up handkerchief.

"That's just your anger speaking," Faith said, coolly.

"I'm not angry-"

"Ho ho ho, pull the other one, Walter Blythe! You are fit to burst, I can see that at least. I know what it's like to feel mad at the world. I was so cross when Mother died I could barely keep still. I remember bed time was such a trial -poor Una, she's probably _still_ got the bruises from all my kicking. But I was just boiling over with the unfairness of it all. And so are you. It just comes out differently-"

"Differently?"

"In words. Always trying to catch something and pin it down, as if making sense of it would allow you to make peace with it."

Walter stared at her. That he had not thought of himself this way was already surprising, but that it should be Faith Meredith who had seen this in him was nothing less than astounding. He _was_ angry. By God he was angry! Angry at a world so set on destroying itself and not able to do anything but write of its destruction. He stared out behind them, the sky and the water all merging into one like the great wave Miss Oliver had dreamed of, rushing in and destroying all in its path.

"And you're not angry anymore?"

Though she knew he must be speaking to her it seemed as if Walter was asking the sea. He might ask it all he liked, Faith knew that no answer, no consolation, would be found there.

"How can you ask that? Of course I get angry. Besides a Doctor's the only family who knows more than they would ever want to know about the misery people suffer is a Minister's. And now with this war-" Faith grasped at Walter's hand. "That's why I -I... _feel_ about your brother the way I do. The way he goes after a thing, never letting up or giving in, he has such faith in the world-"

"Whereas I-"

"One is not better than the other Walter," Faith said, shaking her head. "Would you have me compare myself to Una?"

One might as well compare a tiger-lily to a tea rose. Walter grazed his thumb tenderly across the top of her hand."

Did it ever strike you as strange, Una's name? That its Latin meaning is _one,_ yet she is the second daughter."

"I never thought of it till now. How funny, our names are the wrong way round. At any rate perhaps she should have been called Faith."

"Hmm, well now you say that I'm not so sure. Una is rather a singular girl. And when I think of Faith I think-"

"'Of all the gold and all the silver. All the wheat and all the earth...'"

Walter could not have leaped into sea now if he wanted to. He was rooted to the spot as a multitude of feelings drilled through him unmercifully. That he had been sitting with her so comfortably only made it worse. He was embarrassed, proud, hopeful, lost. "Did you like it?" was all he could say.

"I'm not even going to answer that, Walter Blythe."

"You hated it then." He realised Faith's hand was still in his and let her go.

"It's not a question of hate ...or l-love" Faith stammered, "It's a, it's a question of-"

"Jem." Walter said simply. "Do you love him?"

"If I did Walter Blythe then I would tell _him_ before I would tell _you_," Faith answered, she crossed her legs and patted down her skirts.

"You love him."

"Don't put words in my mouth."

"But you are about to put words into my mouth, aren't you? You are going to tell me that I don't-"

"I, oh..."

"It's alright, Faith. I know."

"What do you know?"

Walter paused and then suddenly -worryingly, Faith thought- looked at her and grinned. "I just saw something that wasn't there."

He was Walter again. Dearest, darling Walter. Her friend of old, and, Faith hoped -please let it not be too much to hope- her friend forever.

"I will always be there for you, Walter-"

Such a phrase should have hurt, should have been like a poison to him. But instead he felt this too was something he could bear, and not only for himself but for her.

"Be there for Jem. He will need you more than ever, now." It was Faith's eyes who darted to the sea now, as though expecting to see Jem lost upon the waves.

"You don't really want him to go, do you?" Walter asked her.

She turned back and patted the top of his hand. "I wish there wasn't a need, but no -I know he will want to go... And I know I will have to let him..." She was quiet again, though Walter knew she had so much more to say. He also knew that he would never be the one to hear it. "I will depend upon you, Walter," Faith said at last, "When Jem and Jerry leave-"

"You think I won't go, too?" he said, dully.

"I thought -with the fever, I assumed that you couldn't."

"No. I couldn't."

"Then we must take care of each other."

Faith smiled again and it was enough. Tomorrow it might not be. But tomorrow lay behind that door now, there was no knowing what he would find in tomorrow. Tonight however, he had Faith's hand in his and her smile to enjoy, and it was, miraculously, enough.

**… … …**

"Walter, Faith!" Di called out, the thrill of a newly gleaned discovery sounding in her voice. It gave way to confusion when she and Nan were brought up cold by the realisation that Walter and Faith Meredith were standing alone, holding hands, and gazing at the sea together.

"What- Where are Jerry and Jem?" Nan exclaimed. "You all rowed away from us like the hounds of hell were on your heels!"

"Walter, why are you walking Faith home?" Di asked.

They peered at the couple curiously, while Una and Miss Oliver, Shirley and Carl came strolling up behind.

"Jem and Jerry were jawing on about the news," she said, brightly. "You know what they're like-"

Di looked at her brother, with sharp green eyes and he gave a small shrug.

"Jem and I quarrelled -no it's alright, Faith- Jem was quite right," Walter said, firmly, "I had no right to say what I did."

Di took his arm and nestled against him. They knew Jem had been fuming but assumed all was made well when Walter suddenly leaped into Jem's boat instead of coming in their own. It all began within moments of Jack Elliott's announcement of war. Jem had raced off impatiently looking for Captain Jo to raise the flag. But his enthusiasm was soon worn down by all manner of party guests demanding he explain exactly what his brother was on about. It seemed Walter had not been content to throw cold water on everyone's excitement but buckets of bloody feeling.

"Yes, you do," Di said, "You are honest to the feelings in your heart. Jem ought to understand that-"

Walter pulled away, he did not deserve her comfort. "It's Jem who'll be suffering, it's Jem who'll be going-"

"What?" Nan exclaimed. If Jem was set on going then that would mean... "Are they already talking of enlisting? This is like a bad dream!" She looked about with a panicking heart and caught Miss Oliver's dark eye. There was something not right about her, something was missing... "Where is Rilla, Walter, did she not come in your boat?"

"Rilla? No- we assumed you'd found her!" Faith exclaimed. "Have we left her at the Light?"

"Oh, this is really heaping Pelion on Ossa!" Gertrude Oliver groaned, feeling she would rather be at home tucked up with her dark dreams than deal with this.

"I'll go back and look for her," said Walter, pulling away from the circle, "Shir, you'll walk the girls back, won't you? You may bump into Jem along the way-"

"I can go with you if you like, Walt?" Carl offered.

"Let's head back to the Manse at all accounts," said Di, decidedly, then turned to see her brother so small against a looming sky she felt he shouldn't be alone. "Unless you want someone to come with you, Walter?"

"No. It was my idea that Puss should come tonight, it should be me who goes." He placed a peck on Di's cheek -I'm alright sis!- then turned back up the Harbour Road. He had not gone a few paces before calling out. "I say, where did you last see the little minx?"

"That's what _we've_ all been talking about!" Nan laughed.

**… … …**

"Ken?"

Walter had not been in the world he walked in, else he would have discerned that the uneven footfall coming toward him could have only come from one man.

"Walter," Ken said, with equal surprise, "are you on your way back to the Light?"

"Yes. Looking for Rilla," Walter said, noticing Ken assume the careless blank look he gave to protective older brothers. "She not with you, I take it?"

"No, why -I, no." Ken muttered, knowing he'd been utterly seen through- those damnable Blythe eyes! There would be no avoiding that question now. One could not whisk the Doctor's daughter away from a 'big cross on the calendar' affair and expect these upstanding Island folk not to notice. He smoothed back his hair. It was time to go to the barber, should he chance it in the Glen -perhaps a couple of days in Charlottetown were in order?

"I thought you took a buggy?" Walter said.

Ken gave him a devilish grin. "I did. But someone was in greater need of it than I was."

"Jolly nice of you, considering that foot."

"Not so nice as all that." Ken gave a small laugh remembering the unlawful look on Ethel Reese's face when she saw it was not Ken Ford who would be sitting next to her on the ride back to Over-Harbour. "There were a few at the party rather keen for a drive home so I let Dunstan Cole have the privilege."

"Was Rilla one of them?"

Ken was not smiling now. "No. Though I'm sure she'll have no trouble finding someone else to take her."

"She was quite the hit, wasn't she."

Right on target, Ken thought. "Mmm, I saw her with a group of Upper Glen girls, some of the Crawford clan, I think it was."

He knew exactly who Rilla had been sitting with and for how long. Always looking to see if she might look for him. The rest of the evening a tedious collection of worthy conversations he couldn't hope to contribute to in any meaningful way when Ned _would_ keep playing and Rilla _would_ keep dancing. In the end her silly slippers had won out, and Ken left her with her chums when the last dance had been called. There had been nothing left to stay for. A dance is for dancers, he had been a fool to come.

"-won't get into much trouble. Not when Mollie has old Thaddeus Crawford to answer to," Walter was saying.

"Well, I... You didn't want me as part of the search party, did you?"

Walter saw very well that Ken hoped he did not. "No. As you say I'm sure Rilla will be able to make her way home. Her lateness will scarcely register on the scale of things to talk about."

There it was. _War_. Back front and centre where it demanded to be.

"I know," Ken said, his voice betraying a bitter disbelief, that the biggest moment of his life had arrived and he wasn't ready for it. "I can't help but feel I should return to the Croft."

"I hadn't considered... but of course you'll want to be home now."

The thought left Walter desolate. He hadn't realised how much solace he found in the thought of Ken staying on with him this summer. The two invalids together whilst Canada's finest donned their battledress in readiness for 'The Great Game'.

"You'll want to be home, yourself," said Ken, "did you draw the short straw?"

"Sorry?"

"Your spider-hunt. Why is it you've been sent to look for littlest Blythe all alone?"

"Oh. I didn't care for company, but... I could really use some now. Mind if I walk back with you?"

Poor old thing, Ken thought. He had heard Walter let slip a few alarming things at the Light. He felt fairly alarmed himself. His head ached, his foot ached, and his heart... He thought the walk would do him good. What could be more restorative than a stroll along a coppery road, under a moon that painted every green thing softly pale? But each step only brought to mind the girl he was walking away from. The Island could offer no remedy, what he needed was a touch of Toronto.

"Let's try our luck and hunt up some fizz at the coach house!" Ken announced, in that dapper way that was pure city boy, "After all," he added, "there's such a lot to celebrate."

Indeed, thought the boy beside him -whose own thoughts dwelt ungratefully on the smallness of Island life. Of Ingleside all lit up, the 'phone trilling ceaselessly, the look Mother would give him that said 'At least you won't leave me', the look Father would give Jem that said 'You know what must be done'. The look Jem would give him._ Jem_. He could not endure it. Not yet.

"Sure thing," Walter said, with a flippancy he did not feel. Oh to _not_ feel, just for a while. He could learn a trick from the cad beside him. Ken, who had spirited Rilla away for almost two hours it was said, yet he wasn't walking her home and he didn't want to go back for her.

A sound of footsteps, the tapping of a young girl's shoes could now be heard. They couldn't be Rilla's, this girl came from the same direction that Walter had. The two boys peered into leaf-dappled gloom trying to make out who was tripping toward them. They saw her hair first, a brilliant burst of red that not even midnight could overcome.

"Di!" Walter cried, quickening his steps and reaching her in a moment that felt much longer than it was. "What- what is it, Di?"

Di lowered her head to her knees and gave over to a few deep breaths before looking up with an unexpected grin. "What a piece of luck! I thought I should have to run the whole way -these shoes..."

Though neither knew it both Ken and Walter had fleeting but withering thoughts about the wisdom of women and their preposterous footware.

"Di, you look quite done in," Ken remarked.

"I could say the same for you!" she blazed back.

"What is it, Di? Seriously now," Walter asked her.

"I don't really have a serious answer. You looked so lost when you set off that I couldn't bear it, I had to come after you!" and she beamed at them both.

What rot that Di should be denied her share of pink, Walter thought. The colour bloomed on her face and she glowed with a rare beauty, which when it showed itself, made the loveliness of other girls look downright conventional. There was a lively thread of freedom running all through her, brought about by the bliss of being out alone. And on such a night, one that seemed to spark with its own importance.

"You are a Di-amond!" Walter chuckled.

"Aren't I just," she replied, plumping out the blue satin bow at her hip, "So gents, are you all for home? I think our lot will still be at the Manse if you want to come along, Mr Ford-"

"Shall we leave it till another night, then-" Ken said to Walter. To lead him astray would be selfishness now. Kenneth Ford might always be looking to suit his own needs but was at not so self-absorbed that he did not know it. Now was a time for family not brooding outsiders.

"No fear, Ford," Walter said with a wink. An electric night with his two favourite people, this felt like the first piece of good news he'd had in weeks. "Ken's just invited me -champagne at the coach house! Care to?" he asked his sister.

"Try and stop me!" Di replied.

**… … …**

_Hun is a Chinese word for an ancient people who were notorious for their merciless and brutal practices in battle, which a 19th German general wanted to model his army on. The word was appropriated by Allied forces in WW1 as a derogatory term for German soldiers, to describe them as mindless, heartless barbarians._

_poetry fragment from Neruda's Fickle One_


	7. Tea and Sympathy

**Tea and Sympathy**

_In which the family at the Manse are introduced; Ken, Walter and Di let loose; and Jem holds on for all he's got_

_**The Manse, Harbour Road; the small hours of August 5th, 1914**_

A lone lamp flickered by the front door of the Manse and painted a yellow wedge on the cold stone porch. All else was wrapped in darkness except one window that winked like a child pretending to sleep. It belonged to the large front parlour, though it had always and ever been known as the Calling Room. A place where people, inspiration, and God no less, should be always welcome at any hour. Light here showed in chinks from clumsily drawn curtains. This in itself did not mean anyone stirred within. The minister, John Meredith, would often forget to extinguish the lamps and leave at least one candle burning throughout the night. And though it may have given comfort to those driven to his door as a lamb to the shepherd, or evidence to others he earned every penny of his stipend, that the house had never burnt to the ground showed Providence looked with a watchful eye over each and every Meredith.

Tonight Reverend Meredith thought it couldn't hurt to help Providence along and keep the door to the Calling Room firmly shut -no need for anyone else to hear the conversation occurring within. There was, however, no way of preventing its irascible tone reverberate into the hallway and up to the room directly above. Here sat John's wife, who among her many excellent qualities was often described as material proof of the Reverend's belief in 'hope over experience' as gentle hearted folk would say. Or his 'second go at it' by those with the stonier kind.

Her flaxen hair glowed white against the window pane as she waited in her unlit bedroom for the children to return from the dance at Four Winds. Unlit because she knew how Carl would roll his eyes to see Mother Rosemary perched on the window seat waiting up for them. And had it been yesterday Rosemary might have said that if he didn't like it next time she would watch for them all at the gate!

Oh, to return to yesterday when so slight a thing was all there was to trouble them.

In truth she sat in the dark because she did not want to see her face reflected back in the unforgiving window, hollow eyed and blotchy from the tears that had fallen an hour before. Tears that must still show in a dark patch on the lapel of John's black jacket. Rosemary foresaw she would spend many hours here in the coming months waiting for the children to return to them.

She saw two striding toward the Manse just as the handle of the door to her room was turned, and a little boy in crumpled flannel wobbled over to her.

"Bruce, come sit by me, darling," said Rosemary, glad that the dim room hid her face, and gladder still she had a wee, warm body to hold against hers. "Look out the window, do you see? Two little birds come back to us."

"Mother, I heard noises. Mother, what is Marmagebbon?"

"Look, Bruce, down there! Two fine birds at our gate, a black bird and cardinal. What do you suppose they could be chattering about?"

No sooner had she said this than she knew. The serious faces -and worse- not a sweetheart on either arm. The young men could only be talking of one thing. The same subject her husband was now mired in downstairs. _Armageddon_, indeed. Amos McAllister had no right to parade up here with the Good Book in hand predicting doomsday. And not because the old man sought solace but because he had foreseen this 'Great Reckoning' and wanted acknowledgement of the fact. Not for the first time Rosemary wished that people might remember John Meredith was not only father to his flock, but to his own children. She nuzzled into Bruce's soft, black hair and breathed in the wholeness and purity that was a small child. Could they not have one moment to reflect how war would affect their own before contending with the sanctimony of McAllisters?

"Jerry birdie and Jem birdie have all flown away..." Bruce yawned, and his mother peered out to the gate and saw that her little man was right. Jerry must already be inside, with the rest of the party coming up behind. She carried Bruce to her bed, tucking a thick Welsh blanket round him as he buried his flossy head into outsized feather pillows. A lamp was lit with the tiniest flame before she made her way down the grand old staircase to do what Minister's wives do best, and dole out the tea and sympathy.

**… … …**

"You'd better put in another spoon, I think," Jerry said, loosening the black bow-tie at his throat and rolling it neatly into his jacket pocket. His father would have dropped it unthinkingly upon the kitchen mantel, Rosemary thought with a little smile, as she dug the silver spoon back into her box of tea.

"The girls will be wanting it milky. And your father and Mr McAllister are taking something rather stronger than tea I expect. Am I to assume someone else is coming, I should have thought the Blythes would be making a beeline for Ingleside?"

One Blythe in particular came to mind. Their autumn coloured daughter -all nut brown hair, rosehip mouth and eyes like the first little blaze on the first squally day. Surely there to be were no more grand announcements tonight or she would have to join John and the port decanter herself.

"Yes and no, it's-

"_Jem!_" the two said at once.

"Well hit, Mother R. Yes, he's out in the garden," Jerry continued, though Rosemary was to understand that by garden he also meant dog-house.

Another woman might have responded with 'Nothing wrong, I hope?_'_ But after all her years as the shoulder for the Glen to cry on Mrs Meredith knew such platitudes did more harm than good. Obviously something must be wrong for Jem Blythe to be skulking about in the dark with the catmint and phlox. There was only one in this world who could drive such a fellow to that. She found herself thinking of Faith now, their galloping, high-summer beauty, who could no more be parted from Jem Blythe than lightening from thunder.

There was no use muddling it out with Jerry, it was not the first time those two had come to a head over something. A butting of heads, wasn't that how Carl described it? Murder while you do it but lovely when you stop.

"Shall I take him his tea?" Rosemary asked, little knowing what she would say to the young man if she did. Jem Blythe's vivid manner and bright confidence could sometimes claim the sound from her voice.

"No. Faith should be here in a mo'. Might be better if she goes."

Nicely done, Rosemary thought, hiding a smirk in an especially careful pouring of the kettle into the teapot. Jerry Meredith had all the makings of an excellent minister, and she wished she could think of a phrase more apt than 'if the mountain won't come to Mohammed'. John would know, of course. Perhaps if she were to interrupt him with a question of doctrinal importance Mr Fire-and-Brimstone might finally take it upon himself to leave the way he came.

Presently the front door did sound and they were blessed with far more welcome additions, as Faith, Una and Carl came bounding into the hallway.

"Hello! Hello there!" was the silvery call, the lively tripping of three pairs of feet like a drum to all their piping.

In a flash of emerald silk came Faith. "Rose-Mother, what are you still doing up? Did Jerry drag you out of bed to make him his tea?" and she swooped through the dear, battered kitchen, giving her brother a tweak on his nose before kissing her step-mother's cheek.

"You haven't been to bed yet, have you, Mother Rosemary?" said Una, who already had the creamer in hand and poured it just so, from the dash to the dollop exactly as everyone preferred.

"No milk for that one, I think, Una," Rosemary said of the last cup in the queue, and looked at Faith. "That's right, isn't it, love, Jem doesn't take milk in his tea, does he?"

Faith went as white as the creamer's contents and she stole a look at her black-haired brother. Who, drat him, was eyeing up Carl's tie suspiciously -as if he didn't already know his younger brother had helped himself to it earlier that evening. Stop pretending not to notice and look at me_, _she wanted to cry. Instead she gave a little cough whilst Rosemary and Una stood with sugar bowl and milk jug respectively, all patient anticipation of Faith's answer.

"N-no, he doesn't," she stammered, followed by, "why?"

Oh darling girl! Rosemary thought, longing to take the flustered creature in her arms and squeeze the life out of her. How much easier it was to love a little child who could be depended upon to squeeze you back. Grown ups just seemed to give each other tea.

"Give him this then, there's a good girl," she said, and handed her a mug. Rosemary Meredith knew better than most that the late hour demanded a sturdy cup, when hands needed something strong and warm to hold onto.

Faith began to dart about the kitchen table before noticing Jerry pointing in the direction of the back door. She left the room with a face that was considerably pinker and a good strong brew for the lad who lurked outside. While Carl, Una, Jerry and Rosemary commenced big eyed exclamations at each other as they silently sipped at their own.

**… … …**

There was no room at the Inn they were told, but they were not so disappointed as they might have been. After Ken slipped the keeper a wad of notes they were then bestowed -in the manner of frankincense and myrrh- with two of the Coach house's best bottles of bubbly. Which Ken saw were not to be sniffed at, though Walter and Di would have happily guzzled it whatever the vintage.

There was still the matter of where they should go, until they discovered the bicycle. Then Ken played Joseph and naturally Di played Mary, so it was up to Walter to be donkey. And he balanced them all with the necessary skill of a child from a large family and not enough bikes, his sister straddling the cross bar, and sore-footed Kenneth on the back holding onto Walter's middle. With such a weight on the iron frame it took a few solid pushes on the pedals before they got going, but with the momentum of bodies and laughter and Newton behind them they were soon careening down the Harbour Road, and then -more from habit than forethought- clattering over the bridge and flying full tilt past the Manse.

It was on crossing that bridge and on sight of the Manse -or rather the thought of one daughter therein- that Walter began to sing, with a voice that would have brought tears to the eyes of many a guest at the White Sands Hotel.

"Daisy! Daisy! Give me your answer do..."

It was not long before Ken joined in, his velvety baritone resonating through Walter as he sang by his ear-

"I'm half crazy, all for the love of you!"

Di, who was carefully cradling the champagne in her lap with one hand whilst clinging onto the handlebars with the other, took a little more time to get into the swing. And had only just begun to sing how sweet Daisy would look on her seat, when she -and the two others behind her- lost theirs and went walloping into the sweet summer grass grown long in the Methodist cemetery.

Such collisions are never so much fun as they appear. After much rubbing of sore bits and language not meant for hearing, the three decided that if a manger was good enough for the Saviour, a graveyard was good enough for them. They piled around an obelisk crusted with yellow and worked out the cork of the first bottle of champagne.

"I say, Di Blythe, are there no end to your talents? To take a spill like that yet keep both bottles intact," Ken laughed, ignoring gentleman's rules and taking the first swig before passing it to the girl beside him.

"I wish I could say the same for my dress," Di replied, examining where the beaded applique had come unstitched. She did not even want to think about the grass stains, though it wasn't the stains so much as Susan's reaction to them that truly worried her. Wasn't there something about white wine taking out the stains of red? Did the same apply to champagne and grass she wondered, taking a little sip.

"Never mind Di, we'll all be in khaki soon enough. Then you can fall into graveyards as much as you like- Ow! What was that for?" Ken exclaimed.

"If you don't realise what you've just said to my sister, Ken Ford, then I think I will take that bottle off your hands," said Walter sharply. "In fact I don't like it here at all. There's something about gadding about amongst the headstones right now that seems to laugh at fate."

"Walter Blythe -I never took _you_ for the superstitious type," Ken said.

"Full of surprises, that's me. Come along you two, the Valley's just through this woodsy bit. Why don't we go somewhere that stirs up happy memories, in the spirit of those old days?"

_The spirit of those days_. The phrase seemed to mock at Ken. He had said the very words to Rilla when they had walked along the sandbar... When was it? It felt like last year, yet it had only been a few hours ago.

There was worse to come when the first place they came to was Rilla Blythe's tree tower. Di had already kicked off her slippers and proceeded to climb the planks nailed into the trunk before Ken could convince her otherwise. She wouldn't get _him_ up there, however. Ken could not have borne the memory that dwelled in that place, of a freckled girl in chestnut braids and a little smocked apron. The Rilla of two short years ago. He could see there would be no moving her sister on either (now currently in raptures about the much remembered sweetness and misremembered smallness of the hut in the treetops) and so slumped near the trunk below, pleading his old standby -the ankle. Walter too, preferred to stay on solid ground, but for a different complaint, that Di took almost all the room up there.

They lay in the grass and sent their conversations heavenward, though there was rather more drinking than talking. Di, who had the first bottle, far too busy enjoying the way the bubbles flew so creamily down her throat to even think of grass-stains now. Which is how she came to be asleep while the other two made quick work of the second.

"Di-lemma, darling?" Walter called up, wondering if his sister had any left.

"She's sozzled, look!" Ken laughed. They peered up at Di, whose face peeped over the edge of the treehouse platform, her chin propped on her forearm and eyelids shut in little smiles.

"_Women!_" Walter exclaimed, lying back and cradling his head in his hands.

"Couldn't have said it better, myself!" said Ken, chasing at a tingly drip that ran down his jaw and under his shirt collar. He tugged on the bow tie at his neck and it fell away easily -cracking work, Mim. The stiff collar was next to go. Would he ever get used to these things, even a clerical collar looked more comfortable, surely that couldn't be fair?

"Let's swear them off, forever, I say!"

"Amen," Ken replied, before realising that Walter was speaking of woman not celluloid. He turned his face skyward, there were no stars to be seen under the canopy they lay under. Just leaf upon leaf, dark and downturned like a million lowered lashes. "Yes," he declared, "no more slow waltzes-"

"No more unsuitable dresses-"

"No to silly slippers!" Ken crowed.

"And their kicking feet," Walter added.

"No more long letters-"

"And _no_ more poetry-"

"No more poetry?-" Ken spluttered, rolling up on his elbow.

Walter laughed. So Kenneth Ford _did _like his poems after all! "Well, no more high romance then ...No more goddesses or queens or maidens-"

"_Definitely_ no more maidens-"

"Nor quests or warriors of old-"

Ken eyed the boy spurning all he held dear. He knew that bitterness, the one that stamped its foot and declared if it couldn't have _one_ thing then it wouldn't have _anything._ He began plucking at the grass, firing clumps of it at Walter's head.

"Oh, I don't know," Ken said, as Walter huffed at the green stuff that had fallen into his eyes. "Knights and warriors are rather necessary, don't you think?"

Walter turned so that the grass fell away, looking where it fell and not at his friend. "Quite right, Mr Ford. What would I else would write about if not great battles and fields of blood-" The fun had gone out of him now. What a fraud he was, writing of battles and yet terrified to engage in one.

"Exactly!" Ken said emphatically, not as oblivious as he wished he was to the brooding sound in Walter's voice. "That's the proper thing, isn't it? The stuff of men."

"Well, I'm all for the proper thing."

"Except ...it doesn't sell _half_ so well, Walter," Ken winked at him, "as goddesses and queens and maidens do..." and he lay back in the grass, cradling his head as a certain young poet was known to do.

Dear old Ford. Just when you were in danger of taking yourself too seriously, here was Ken to make you laugh again.

"Well, I suppose I shall just have to be poor." This said as Walter returned the favour and dropped blades of grass all over Ken's head.

A tussle ensued to see who could cram the most leaf litter and dirt into the other's face. When it ended Walter had to remove his own collar and tie to get at the sticks and weeds that had been stuffed down his shirt. Ken could see something of Rilla in him, the way Walter's lashes lay on the topmost part of his cheeks as he felt about for anything else that lingered inside his clothing.

"So you're really swearing women off then?" Ken asked him.

"Said so, didn't I?" Walter chipped back. He began to straighten the lapels of his grey jacket and then stopped. "I have. I did..." his body slumping further with every word that followed. "I told her. Or rather... she told me."

"Faith?"

"Faith-less."

"What?" said Ken, "You mean she-"

"No! Oh God, no -nothing of the sort. I meant _I'm_ faithless. At least Jem thinks I am."

Though neither would have thought it possible, Kenneth Ford was now overwhelmed with the exact desire the good wife of the Presbyterian minister had felt -still felt, as she spied Jerry pacing on the front porch of the Manse- wanting with all his heart to go to Walter and hold him tight. There wasn't even tea to offer him, just an empty champagne bottle lying on its side in the buttercups. And if not these goodly brews then there really was nothing. For if there are a hundred reasons why a mother must hold back, they are ten fold when it comes to the expression of feeling between men. It was a tangled thing this bond between Ken and Walter. And at its centre, inextricable, was Rilla.

"You really love her?"

"When you appear/ all the rivers sound/ in my body, bells/ shake the sky/ and a hymn fills the world/ ...Is that love?" Walter sighed, and flopped down on his stomach. "Do you know she said I write because I'm trying to understand the world. Maybe I am," he mused, dissecting a dandelion's toothy leaf in the manner of Carl Meredith. "Perhaps I'm merely trying to understand what it is to love."

"Well, be sure to let me know when you find out," Ken muttered.

"What? I thought you knew _all_ about it-"

"I know about women, Walter. That is very different."

"_What_ do you know?" he asked, studying him curiously.

What Ken knew was that if he met Walter's gaze he would see those Blythe eyes -Rilla's eyes- staring not at him, but into him. Realising that the reason he couldn't bear such fearless scrutiny was because he suspected there was not much inside him worth seeing. Susan Baker would have clapped her hands together and said, This is what comes of raising children in Toronto!

"Next to nothing -that's what I know," Ken answered.

But he did not add, And how I feel. Because it hadn't been nothing when he took Rilla's hand... Or when they walked along the sand... Or when she sat with him at the Lighthouse. Where she seemed not only with him but _within_ him, filling him with a stupidly wonderful sense of possibility. The champagne did not take the trouble to remind Ken that Rilla could not be carried inside him like a melody or a good meal; that knowing this was not the same as knowing her. A stupidly wonderful smile broke upon his face, the kind that put dimples in his cheeks and a thoroughbred where Rilla's heart had been. One the war, their differences, and all that booze couldn't hope to stifle. Ken didn't even try to hide it. "And whatever you're going to say next," he laughed, "bally well _don't!_

"Well I can't, can I? We swore them off, remember?" said Walter, who had of course seen everything.

"Good man," Ken grinned. He shuffled next to his friend and gave into lassitude brought on by revelation and too much drink. And in giving in found nothing so sweet as sleep.

While Walter lay there next to him and shut those eyes against all he saw, but still could not.

**… … …**

Jem Blythe sat beneath a tree as overwhelmed as he was, perched upon a wooden bench that had been placed there with troubled souls in mind. His own soul not inclined to trouble it had not occurred to Jem to seek this place at first. When Jerry left he went to sit on the stone steps by the back door, and would have remained there if his thoughts had stayed still. Instead he paced along the paths cut into the lawn like moats about the garden-beds towering with their harvests. Only when every turn had been taken did he make his way to the little seat tucked under the quince tree bower.

For all mention of bowers, towers and moats the Meredith garden had not been made with romance in mind. It was a Minister's garden and must therefore exemplify those most sturdy of virtues, utility and husbandry. Every green thing had to earn its keep. Even the quince tree, which hung heavy with unripened pears in velvety golden-green. Jem saw Faith immediately, walking in the moonlight straight toward him on a path designed for wheelbarrows not lovers. There would be no chance happening-upon. He had all the time he needed to think of what to say. Which is why he had no one to blame but himself when the first thing he said when she approached him -cup in hand, eyes aflame- was,

"Where's Walter?"

Faith dropped the tea beside him, all thoughts of pressing it lovingly into his hands set coldly aside.

"Looking for Rilla. I thought you would have gone, Jem." She looked as if she was about to do the same.

He reached her hand and Faith recalled that forsaken moment when she had tried to do the same. But it was not within Faith Meredith to hold a grudge, why should she when it was his hand she wanted? Jem allowed himself a deep breath, the first since he had rowed them all so angrily from the Light, as Faith's fingers folded round his and she sat down beside him.

"It's all a bit of a mess, isn't it?" Jem noticed that Faith couldn't quite look at him as she spoke.

"Is it?"

"With you and Walter, and you and me, and..."

"And _you_ and Walter," Jem said coldly.

"I'm not here to talk about your brother!"

Faith was all heat when she spoke of Walter, yet distant when she spoke to him. It couldn't be the war that made her so, Faith would be the first to enlist if she could. Was it -could it really be- that confounded book of poetry? The one that had all the Glen girls swooning, the one that spoke of Faith Meredith in a way that Jem could not. He tried to swallow, but it was like trying to force down one of those lumpen pears that dangled in the branches of the quince tree.

"Speak for yourself, then," Jem said hoarsely, as much to himself as to Faith. Because as he looked at the girl beside him the only words he could think of were the luminous words of his brother-

_Like a tree of gold/ swaying her gifts/ Like a wave/ discharging lightening bolts  
><em>

Walter's poems captured her spirit so perfectly, might they also capture her heart? Jem leaped from the bench and stood before her.

"Why don't you speak?" he demanded. When she still refused to meet his gaze he fell to his knees, weaving his fingers with hers as he had the night they first kissed. "What is it Faith? What's happened?"

She couldn't help but look at him now, and saw that while his eyes were hot and imploring his body seemed stiff and awkward. He was Jem and he was not. The Jem she knew, the fiery haired, fiery hearted man was not the sort to kneel at her feet. The Jem she knew, who spoke of brotherhood, not the man who laid so coldly into Walter.

"What's happened to _you_, Jem?"

"Happened to _me?_ Nothing …and _every_-bally-thing!" It all came out now, released from inside and offered to her with all that he was. "I know now, Faith, I mean I _know_-"

"_What_ do you know?"

"What I am meant for_._ To be a real man one must know to his very soul what he was meant to do. And then do it. Fearlessly. With all his heart-"

The sacred chill of truth being spoken rang throughout his body. He thought he'd understood his father's words, proudly offered on the news of Jem's acceptance to medical school. But he didn't know it, not truly, until now. Jem looked to burst with passion and life. So alive the only thing Faith could think of was of the day he would not be. That there might be a white wooden cross waiting to have James Blythe's dear name printed on it, while she must remain in the world they had made without him.

"You were meant to die in battle, were you? You, who knows where to find the first of the mayflowers, and the bluest robin's eggs, the most fragrant honeycomb, and the- the secret tree? _Our secret_ tree. You are meant to leave these things and die in another land!"

"What are you saying -that Walter's right? That-"

"I'm saying I don't want to _lose_ you, Jem!" Faith loosened her hands and cupped his face. The face that was more than handsome to her, but divine and best in all the world.

"So don't!"

"What?"

Jem gazed at her, wide eyed and flushed, pulling her hands into his chest. "Marry me!"

"_What!_" Faith watched him like one who sees but does not believe, as Jem lifted up one knee and planted his foot on the ground.

"Walter's book... this war... my future, it all comes back to you. I'm in love with you, Faith... I -I love you."

"_Love_ me?"

"Do... do you not?"

A cold shard went into him, one that he knew would numb him eventually, he had only to live with intolerable pain until then. Not the loss of all those faithful mutts, nor the fever that threatened to claim Walter -or the day Jem read his twelve page ode _To Rosamond,_ not even the unknowable and unspeakable horror of the years to come came close to this moment. His heart seemed to stop and did not start again until Faith would speak.

But she wasn't speaking, she was smiling wildly. And in between her smiles raining kisses on his cheeks, his nose, his hair. Her body thrumming with beats proclaiming, Of course_, _he loves me! Of course, he loves me! Jem Blythe, who lived a life that was bold and blessed, had been overcome with wretchedness for only one reason -the thought he might lose her. Only once she understood did she find her voice.

"Oh, James Blythe, oh my heart, did you not know?" Faith murmured into him. "You, who have always been able to find what is best and beautiful in this world, never once thinking of keeping it for yourself. From that first day we met in the Valley... Oh, I knew it _then. _And I know it now... There could _never_ be anyone else. Never has been," she said, kissing above one hazel eye, "never will be," kissing the other.

He opened them and looked at her, bringing her fingers to his mouth and covering them with kisses of his own. Not until each fingertip, and the braided river of veins at her wrists, and delicate crease inside her elbows had been anointed did Jem remember he still did not have his answer.

"Do you love me, Faith?"

"Love you? Why else would I be kissing you every chance that I can get-"

_"_Because I'm good at it?"

_"_You're good at everything, you're good at life!"

"I'll be a good husband," Jem said, shyly, "What do you say, Faith, my knee's about to give out."

"Gladly, joyfully, yes, yes, yes! I love you_,_ Jem, I _love_ you-"

She pulled Jem up toward her, about to press her lips to his when she laughed into his mouth as they heard faint strains of 'A bicycle built for two' being sung full pelt by two rowdy but rather harmonious voices.

"...Give me your answer do, I'm half crazy all for the love of you!"

The laughter was short lived, consumed by joy far more intense. There were no more words to say, nothing heard but small sighs and the whispering leaves. Jem and Faith standing beneath the boughs holding each other as they had that day they discovered their secret tree. Unfortunately there were quinces to contend with this time. Jem's auburn head knocking them about, until one fell with a decided plop straight into the mug of cold black tea.

**… … …**

same poetry fragment from Fickle One

**Thank you for reading :o)**


	8. Morning through the Shadows

**Morning through the Shadows**

_In which Walter and Jem come together; Nan and Jerry come apart; and Gilbert Blythe comes to his own bend in the road.  
><em>

**Rainbow Valley, Glen St Mary; just before sunrise...  
><strong>

Sleep must have come to Walter Blythe because the hands of chestnut leaves that rustled above him had suddenly become his sister's, waving over his face and shaking his shoulder in order to wake him.

"Walter, Walter, it's nearly dawn."

Walter felt himself being rocked away from something warm and solid and squinted up at Di. "Hold up, I'm awake, I'm awake," he muttered, noticing Ken breathing softly next to him. Vague but insistent remnants of a dream urged inside, which he shook from himself as he jerked up and shuffled away.

"Father will be livid!" Di exclaimed, smoothing back her hair, as if the Doctor's anger could be lessened if she arrived at Ingleside impeccably presented. It seemed Walter was having the same thoughts and ran about hunting in the grass for his collar and tie. "Come on- we haven't time!"

"What about Ken?" Walter said, stuffing the tie into his pocket. "We couldn't just leave him here."

"Couldn't we just," said Di, who sounded more flippant than Walter supposed she meant to, no doubt preoccupied with the thought of Father lurking on the veranda. Of all the nights, when their parents would have so much on their minds, to be so unthinking, so selfish. He was glad at least he had a partner in crime, someone else to share the shame as they looked at their empty pudding plates in the coming week. Or would Susan make it a month?

But it would not be within Susan's power to withhold the pudding spoon that day. Nor did a stern face greet them at the gate. As they hastened up the slope to Ingleside they began to realise that their lives had already begun to change. There was no Father, no Mother, nor Susan awaiting them, but Jem, sprawling on the front steps. And what he was holding could not have surprised Walter more had the Kaiser, himself, been pruning the roses that grew up the porch posts. On Jem's lap -and being read at that- was Walter's little book, _The Sun Rescinds._ The rushing river in Walter's feet suddenly dried up.

Di overtook him and went to scoot into the house, though not before Jem put the book to use, the kind of use Walter had rather more expected of him, and patted Di's behind with a remonstrating clap. On another day Di would have whipped the book from her brother's hand and socked him on the head with it. Instead she took it silently, stepping inside without a backward glance and disappearing up the stairs.

Walter stood before Jem, who looked up at his brother, tieless and grassy haired, and felt a smirk tug at the corners of his mouth thinking how much Walter reminded him of himself. Whilst Jem on the steps, book in hand, seemed in the exact attitude of his younger brother.

"Good night?" Jem asked him.

"Good book?" Walter lobbed back.

Jem gazed down at it, observing its supple green leather, the soft gold type face proclaiming the author, W.C. Blythe, along its spine. "It's a good size, nice thickness ...not too heavy. Yes it will do," he said, looking up at Walter's uncomprehending face. "Should fit snugly into the chest pocket of my khakis, don't you think? Intercept a shot before its hits."

"You're not talking of cupid I take it?"

"He did his damage long ago, Walt."

Something in his tone told Walter Jem was not sorry that love's arrows had made their mark. His brother and Faith must have made good and he was glad. Walter looked up at the house still curled up in sleep. Fingers of light would soon tap at the windows of Ingleside and ignite little fires on each pane of glass. He remembered Faith's eyes when she talked of Jem and wondered if he would ever inspire a look like that.

"Dads not about?"

"You're in luck," Jem said, drawing his feet up a step, "Patience Sinclair went early with her twins. The shock of the news, I suppose. Greenface Bill always said he couldn't wait for the 'Game' to start so he could throw in his job with the fishing fleet."

"Though it would be fair to say he won't be joining the Navy," said Walter.

"I don't think you've ever said a thing that wasn't fair..." Jem's eyes filling with regret, "I wonder if you could say the same about me..."

"Jem-"

"No," Jem said, firmly. "Let me say it, Walter. I don't have your way," he rapped on the hard-back cover, "but that doesn't mean I mustn't make the attempt. I was -that is, I _am_ sorry. So sorry. For what I said last night. It wasn't- well it wasn't you. And I hope you know that it really wasn't me. It was just..." he began to smooth his fingers over the green leather.

"Just love." Jem nodded, he had meant to say war and then realised once again that Walter had found the words he couldn't. "I am hardly one to judge, Jem, I go off all the time-"

"That's different-"

"Love makes one do foolish things," Walter continued, and Jem's heart quickened, bracing himself to hear that his brother was in love with Faith. "Love for the world ...For its beauty and its people ...For what we have made of it. I can't bear to see it all destroyed."

Jem saw that Walter wouldn't say it. Well, he didn't need to -the proof of it lay in pages 26 to 40 of the book he was holding. All the same he was relieved, knowing Walter's words would collide painfully with those already ringing in his heart. Faith Meredith's words proclaiming 'Joyfully, gladly, yes yes yes!' Jem never felt such a love and it fired through him now as he spoke.

"It won't be, Walter. I'll fight to protect it, save it the way you saved it in your book. That world will go on forever now, won't it, because of you. And I mean to do the same. We're the same really," Jem grinned, "we both want to save the world."

His words didn't have the effect Jem supposed they might. Walter did not smile or even agree. He turned his face away and looked to the east, chewing on his bottom lip and watching the lightening sky. "Except," he said, "that writing doesn't have the side effect of killing a fellow."

The sun began its final surge against the night yet the dark would have its way. Shadows were called into existence bringing Walter's face into relief. Jen was reminded of his brother hollowed out and burning. Remembering last Christmas when he had asked Shirley to move into Walter's empty bed in their room under the eaves. It was the silence that choked Jem -even as Walter suffered for every breath he took. Walter more than anyone knew what it was to be close to death, to have its cold hand upon one's heart and feel it squeeze. Small wonder he felt the way he did, that he longed for life and for everything that being alive promised a young man. Though Jem did not say this. Words between brothers -words of love- show themselves in other ways.

"_Writing_ it might not, Walter... but _reading_ it definitely will."

Walter reached over and ruffled his brother's hair. "Never was your strong suit, was it, James? Would you like some help with the big words?"

Jem batted him away, half-heartedly. "What say you move back into our old room? Shirley's no bally help, except for all the cake he gets from _Mother_ Susan. But he couldn't help me tell a German word from a Belgian one."

"No need to worry on that account, there aren't any."

Yesterday Jem would have pummelled Walter on the arm and drolly declared, You don't say_. _Now he said, "You see! That's why I need you. How else am I going to sort that lot out?" He stood up and put his arm about Walter's shoulder. So thin, so close to not being here. The black haired boy with a quick silver mind and dawdling feet, he only ever had to turn around and there was Walter just behind him. "But I can't do it," Jem told him, looking straight into his brother's eyes, "unless you have my back."

Both hazel and grey scrunched up unexpectedly as crumbs of cake were rained down on their heads. They looked up to see their little brother leaning out of their attic window.

"Jem, Walt -Mothers on the move!" Shirley hissed, waving at the boys to get inside before they were spotted.

Jem waved back and went up the veranda steps, motioning for Walter to follow.

"Don't worry, brother," Walter said with a smile, "I'm right behind you."

**… … …**

The wallpaper garden went from winter to spring in the east most bedroom at Ingleside. A sun still unvanquished by the cloud that trooped behind it made every girlish thing gold, which in a room that housed the Blythe twins meant a treasure that Solomon might have envied. The book of that King's mines lay open on the floor beside a glinting brass bed, the side where Nan slept -though not for much longer.

"Oof, is it morning already?" she groaned, pulling the quilt over her head.

"Only just," Di replied. She rolled down her stockings and popped them on top of the pile on her bedside table, a higgledy tower of unfinished letters, Walter's first drafts, and books she had swiped from her father's study. She glanced at the largest tome and wondered if it might contain remedies for sore heads or sore heels.

"What on earth are you doing up so early, then?" came the muffled response from under the quilt. "You must have come in ages after I did."

"_Ages_ after, sister dear," Di said, slipping out of her gown. The lost beads, the grass stains, she would save the worrying about them for another, later hour, and flopped upon the bed. "Move over, would you?"

Nan flipped up her eye mask and peered at her sister, suspiciously. "You're getting_ into_ bed?"

"Mmmm. Do you think I could have a turn of that?" Di asked her, reaching for the mask. Nan sat up and flung it across the room, aiming for the dressing-table but landing it instead in the empty grate of the white painted fireplace. "Oh, why did you go and do that for?" she groaned.

"Tell," Nan demanded.

"Nothing to tell -hey-" she yelped, as Nan flung the quilt off her, "give that back!"

"Tell!"

Di huffed. She had hoped to sneak in unnoticed -Nan had the convenient trait of sleeping like so many logs- and thought perhaps she might scrape in three or four hours kip before somebody missed her. There was no chance of that now. Di foresaw a day getting to grips with that ancient coffee-bean grinder that Susan insisted on keeping. She yanked up the blankets and rolled to her side, hoisting herself up on her elbow. Nan sat with her knees drawn up, ready to absorb every piece of news.

"Well... We never found Rilla-"

"Oh, I _know_ that- Mary Vance 'phoned and said she was staying with them," Nan said impatiently. "What else?"

"Rilla stayed with Mary! What on earth? She can't bear-"

"Yes, yes, we are not talking of Puss, right now. We were talking of _you_." Nan's eyes darkened and her mouth was drawn tight, making the face that Walter said made her look like half an apple -pale and crisp with three glossy seeds set in its midst. Di, by contrast, was doing a very good impression of something red and overripe. Something Susan would sniff at and say had tart written all over it .

"Well... So... I bumped into Walter -and Ken, and we... we-had-some-champagne-and-I-fell-asleep-in-the-tree-tower."

"Ooooh! So what was it like?"

"Cold and cramped-"

"No, you great goose. The champagne!"

"Shhhh," Di hissed, glancing at the bedroom door. She fell against the pillows and sighed. "De-licious!"

"Lucky ol' you-"

"Not so lucky as all that." Di went on to detail the damage to her dress, to say nothing of her reputation, or what the as yet blissfully ignorant inhabitants of Ingleside would say. Older ones especially.

"I imagine they'll all be taken up with the war now. I don't suppose we'll we be hearing about anything else -for the next few months, anyway," Nan said, buttoning the last little pearl of the lace at her throat, before fussing about with her hair.

"You don't think Walter's right, that the conflict is likely to draw out for a good duration?" Di asked her.

"No I do _not!_" Nan exclaimed, giving her hair a vicious tug with her enormous tortoiseshell hairbrush. "Jem and Jerry would never _think_ of going if they thought it would last as long as all that."

Di did not reply that if the boys should be proved wrong there would be no way for them to extricate themselves and simply come home. That it could be many months, or heaven forbid, _years_ before they saw each other again. Because although it was going to be terribly hard for Di to wait for Jem and Jerry's safe return, the latter was merely her chum. A very dear one, of course, but still a chum. And whatever her twin might aver she knew that Jerry Meredith was something more than that to Nan. Di watched her sister apply long, even strokes to her hair, which shined as if she painted sunlight on each strand. And saw the ghost of herself snatching the hairbrush and playing it like a violin, whilst singing 'Let me call you Sweetheart_'_ round the room. It would be a heartless thing to do now. Such larks must be consigned to yesterday.

Nan fished the eye-mask out of the grate, sweeping her hand over its pink sateen and laying it by her brush. "I'll do my best to keep Susan off the scent, say you have a headache," she said, kindly.

"And so I do," Di moaned.

"Tell you what, I'll ask Miss Oliver to bring you one of her powders," Nan murmured through the hat pin that she held between her lips, positioning her velvet cap with a becoming little tilt. She swivelled on her heel and tossed the eye-mask at Di, who grasped at it distractedly, overcome with a curiosity of her own.

"Goodness me, you look ravishing. Where on earth are _you_ off to at this hour?"

"Honestly, Di Blythe," Nan flashed back as she headed out the door, "do you think you're the _only_ one to have adventures!"

**… … …**

The morning was a drear one. The splashes of gold that bathed her brothers at dawn had been washed away by the time the first pot of tea had been made in each Glen kitchen. Nan shivered and flipped her hair over her shoulders to warm her neck as she headed to out to the gate. She should have worn her sweater. It was only that her hair looked particularly glossy when it fell over her gauzy white blouse that she gave way to vanity, and -as Jerry would undoubtedly point out- was now justly reproved.

She quickened her step, recalling how she would almost jog to the White Sands school house in the winter months in order to enjoy the merry blazes the eldest Frame boy made for her each morning. The toasty room went some way to compensate for his long awkward stares and poetry (anonymous, but in a hand very similar to a certain red cheeked, thick-lipped boy) frequently bestowed upon Miss Teacher dear. There would be none of that now. Harlan Frame was off to Queens and she to Redmond in the Fall.

When the Harbour Road was reached a foul gust was there to meet her. Nan was attempting to smooth down her hair when she saw Jerry Meredith standing just where he said he would be, by the bridge that lead to Four Winds. He was leaning over the railing looking out at the Harbour, and she smiled as he checked his wristwatch. She pulled her hair into a thick twist and pinned it against her shoulder. He looked up and gave her a wave.

"Good morning Mr Meredith! Faith not with you?" Nan called.

"Morning, Miss B!" he replied, giving her his crooked grin. "No, she's helping out in the kitchen, we're expecting a crowd at the Calling Room today." Nan nodded. She reached behind her head and attempting to tuck her hair under her hat, causing Jerry to study his shoes. He polished one on the back of his calf. "No Jem either?" he asked her.

"N-no..." Nan said, she felt her cheeks redden and hoped her nose wasn't a similar colour -she certainly didn't feel cold anymore. "Father delivered Mrs Sinclair's twins last night. Footling breech, no less. He and the future Dr Blythe were holed up in the study still discussing it when I left." She had half an inkling Di would have enjoyed such a conversation. What a strange thing to be curious about, surely the best thing about childbirth were the little darlings you were presented with at the end of it... Which reminded her, "Victory and Glory she's calling them."

"Not a pacifist then," Jerry said, offering his arm.

"Oh, Jer-ry," Nan sighed, then gave a little smile. It would have been larger had not the wide-eyed faces of Irene Howard and Olive Kirk been spotted on the other side of the bridge, returned from a squeaky night on the Lewison's leather chaise.

"My, my, what a state Nan Blythe's in," Olive remarked to her friend, whilst sending Nan a brilliant smile. "Fancy flaunting yourself with the Minister's son and your hair like a nag's tail!"

"Fancy flaunting yourself at all," Irene replied, with an extravagant wave at the two love-birds. "I can _never_ allow myself to become attached to a boy _now _knowing I would lose him to war. I must love more _deeply_ than _some_ people, I suppose."

Nan waited for them to pass. Why did those cats bother her? Everyone in the Glen had already made up their minds that she and Jerry were sweethearts. Irene and Olive could have nothing new to report -not that it mattered in the least if they did. But somehow she felt as rumpled on the inside as she looked on the outside.

"Carl and Una couldn't come?"

"Only me, as you see," Jerry said, looking a little more crooked, a little less smiling. "Did you still want to-" Nan felt him loosen his hold on her arm and her her hair was forgot as she placed her hand snugly upon his.

"Of course I do," she said, as they made their way across the bridge. "I mean, it _is_ one's patriotic duty." She puffed out her chest, tilted her chin, and gave him the tiniest wink.

"The least one can do," Jerry replied, with a wink of his own. "In lieu of twins, of course."

He drew her arm a little closer. How thoughtful he had been to place himself between her and that wicked breeze. How lovely and warm, too. And he wasn't wearing one of his scratchy Arran sweaters, but his downy, chocolatey one -the one she had teased him went so well with her velvet cap. It did feel nice, just the two of them. Only strange as well, for it hardly ever happened that they were alone. There was always one of the younger set lolling behind them, or Faith and Jem leading the way. Yes, Nan decided, that was what felt so strange, she was used to seeing Jem's auburn head bobbing about instead of a clear view of the road ahead. Jerry must have been enjoying the scenery too, for he scarcely said a word more than she until they rounded the final bend to Four Winds Point.

"Look, Nan. Thar she blows!"

Nan had already spied it a moment before, all the same she hugged against Jerry at the sight of it. The Union Jack flying like the brightest star from the flagpole by the Lighthouse. It was a barnacled bit of iron that pole but Captain Josiah was seeing to that -or his mate was- daubing fat strokes of white paint up and down its rusty length. It was beginning to look rather grand, the shield of Britannia held aloft, even here on the smallest piece of her vast dominion. The Island would show them! Canada would show them! The Kaiser would rue the day! Had Jem and Faith been with them such sentiments would have been shouted into the winds with a spontaneous recital of _God Save the King_ to boot.

That had been the plan, to return in the morn and lay laurels of cheer and spirit neath the flying flag. Last night at least ten youths had sworn attendance -though Nan could not quite regret the lack of numbers now. She did regret that sweater however. The remnants of cobbled wall Jerry found them to sit upon provided a marvellous view but little protection from the gale. He was bound to mock her for once again heeding style before suitability. Instead she found herself going uncomfortably hot as Jerry peeled off his sweater and draped it about her shoulders.

"I hear you lost Rilla," he said, some time after.

"Mmm, at the Douglas'," Nan murmured, absently.

"And Jem and Faith patched it up, I understand," he continued, looking more at her than the flag now.

"Mmm," she said again, tucking away flying strands of hair from her face, touching her cheek and her brow in a way Jerry wished he might.

Nan seemed not to hear him, staring off at the Lighthouse, her eyes not of hearth and home -which is how they'd always seemed to Jerry- but somewhere faraway. Was she remembering last night? How sublime it had been to have her by his side all evening. She seemed not in the least inclined to dance, and when he insisted she must have least one spree on the dance-floor had taken herself to cheer the only lame boy in the room. Of course, it was just like Nan to look out for others but surely that ladykiller didn't qualify for further female attention.

"What of Walter and Jem?" Jerry was scarcely offered so much as a nod. Nan was lost in a way he had never known her to be and he had no notion of how to bring her back. "...And Ken Ford's marrying Ethel Reese-"

"Hmm? Oh, I -Ken's doing _what?_"

"Don't panic. I just wanted to see if you were listening."

Nan grimaced. "Seems like he's been linked to every eligible girl in the Glen."

"Seems like it bothers you."

"He's getting the reputation for being an incorrigible flirt."

As reassuring as it was to have Nan as talkative as ever, Jerry wished it wasn't this particular topic that made her so. "You let him scamper off with Rilla-"

"Oh, Ken's not above making use of us when it suits, he was probably wanting to avoid someone or other," Nan said, hastily. Unconvincingly too, for it was quite obvious to anyone with an ounce of imagination that the only thing Ken Ford wanted to avoid was being discovered with her little sister. She and Di had nattered about it practically non-stop the whole way back to the Harbour. It didn't occur to Nan that Jerry might not share her fascination. "Irene, Hazel, even sweet ol' Betty is mad about him. Puss is probably the _only_ one that he knows won't throw herself at his feet."

"And he doesn't know that about you -about the rest of you, I mean?"

"Throw myself at Ken's feet?" Nan spluttered, "I'd like to see myself! Ken's a chum, a brother, I could _never_ think of him in _that_ way. I knew him when his mother dabbed cologne on his thumb so that it would taste bitter-"

"Ken Ford sucked his thumb?" Jerry exclaimed, with a genuine grin.

"Say Eau de Lavande to him and see if he blushes- Oh, no don't!-" Nan winced. "Why do you _always_ make me say things I never mean to, Jerry Meredith?"

"So you tell me falsehoods, do you?" He stood up and brushed down his trousers before reaching for her hand.

"You know me well enough to know I would _never_ do that." Nan replied, a pale imitation of her crisp schoolmarmish manner. He really was infuriating! She tucked her arm in his nonetheless and they commenced their stroll back to the village. "What I mean is when I'm with you things have a habit of coming out the wrong way. I can't count the times I've come home after some evening we've had together and cursed myself when I realised how you might have misunderstood me-"

Jerry stopped mid stride. "You have?"

"You haven't?" Nan was clearly just as surprised.

"When I think of you, Nan, I am definitely _not_ thinking of things like that."

"Is that so," Nan said, a smile flashed over her face, disappearing just as quickly. "Oh, Jerry, I don't know what I will do if..."

"If what?"

"Oh no you don't," Nan said, pretending to glare at him. "You're just trying to get me to say something that will come out all wrong."

"I wonder..." Jerry began, and then swallowed, "if it's the same thing that I want to say to you?"

"Very probably. That's what Father said, our trouble is we're so alike."

They continued walking toward the Glen, along a road so different to the one before. Sharing the bridge with lorries, bicycles and carriages, the wind as relentless as ever. It was Nan who noticed Jerry's silence now, how curious that among all this noise she should feel it so acutely. "So?" she said, "what did you want to say to me?"

"Well-" Jerry grabbed at the rails on the bridge and stared out at the Harbour, filling his body with the breath of the sea. He should have been gripped with cold, yet he didn't feel it. He turned back and was surprised to see Nan Blythe looking straight at him. Now he felt _everything_. "Why don't you go first, seeing as you say we're so alike."

"I suppose," she said, "that I'm thinking of the war. Jem will go, I have no doubt about that -and I am just as certain that you will go, too." A tiny look passed between them, a spark that fired and died in the same second. Nan looked away, taking hold of the rails, herself, and grasping them tight. "We've talked about it all for so long... in _theory_. But it isn't a possibility anymore. It's _real._ And now that it's here... I'm afraid. I suppose I needed to see that flag today because I wanted to remind myself that it's not just one's duty but an honour to go and fight." Nan looked up at him and pinned back a strand that had settled between her lips. "Only now -and I know that it's selfish, and I know I'm a selfish and frivolous thing- but I can't help thinking on all the things I stand to lose... I'm afraid things will never be the same."

Jerry put his hand up to her face, the face that just an hour before he had longed to touch. She felt soft and cool against his fingers -that much he guessed at. But the feeling that went through him as he drew a line down her cheek was like nothing he had ever known.

"I won't change."

"Of course you will. You won't be my Jerry anymore, in your Arran sweaters and that sweet little cap." She reached up and twitted the brim that angled over his black eyes, "You'll go off and be _Gerald_ in your khakis and your bayonet."

Nan had meant to sound proud but there was a regret in her voice she couldn't quite disguise. Jerry heard it, thrilling inwardly at every word, no word more than when she had called him _my_ Jerry. To think he had been sulking about in a pathetic envy over poor ol' Ford. He began to wish this blasted war was over before it was begun.

"I won't be gone forever, Nan."

"But you'll be changed forever."

"Nan, I won't." Moving closer now, the words -_the_ words_-_ so close to being said. "I won't ever change. God built his church upon a rock, remember? I mean to be that rock for you."

He forgot to breathe when Nan began to cry. Two tears within her shining brown eyes spilling onto her cheeks when she spoke.

"You know, Jerry Meredith, I believe you." Nan gave a wobbly smile and fished about for the handkerchief she had tucked into her belt. "You really are the best person I have ever known. I have so many friends -and heavens, even a twin to turn to- but only one chum like you. Whenever I'm with you I'm so glad to be in the world. Even now. Especially now." She sighed emphatically and fastened his sweater tightly round her neck. "So tell me, was Father right? Were you thinking that I might change, too?" she asked, shyly. Her eyes never brighter, her lashes never darker than now they were washed in tears.

Not tears of love, of course. Tears of mere relief. For a chum, a friend -I could never think of Ken _that_ way- clanging in Jerry's ears, drowning out the bicycle bells and clipping hooves around them.

"More or less," he said, stuffing his hands in his pockets and turning toward the road. "I mean I don't need to worry, do I? I know for sure that you won't change."

"Jerry?" She had done it again. She recognised that face -something she had said had come out _wrong._ He would try to get away from her now.

"Should I see you home?" he muttered, grinding his heel into the salty planks of the bridge.

"If you like... though I'm not expected until dinner," Nan said, hopefully. It really was beastly of him to be so cold when she had practically blubbed a moment ago. She shouldn't have made him feel like she didn't want him to go to war. She knew it wasn't fair but she wouldn't miss anyone half so much as she would miss him. No one else would have understood. She hardly understood, herself. And neither, it seemed, did Jerry.

"Yes, well. It's going to be a busy day at the Manse, as I said. I owe Father more than just a look in, really."

"Of course," she said, dully, "I can see myself... I -I was going along to Carter Flagg's, anyhow."

"Well, see you... old chum!"

It was dismal to watch him walk away and Nan thought hurriedly for a reason, any reason, to call him back.

"Jerry!" she yelled out, running over to him. He stopped at the other end of the bridge but did not turn. "Wait-" she implored, looking up at his pale face, yet that lovely crooked smile did show -she could have kissed it. "Jerry," she said, breathlessly, "you forgot your sweater, you ninny."

He took it from her without thinking and just as quickly pushed it back into her hands. He couldn't bear to have it now, with the smell of her, the warmth of her, in every soft brown stitch.

"You keep it, Nan," he said with a shrug. "I won't need it where I'm going."

**… … …**

Nan did not go to Carter Flag's, nor did any other shop window catch her eye. She wandered down the Harbour Road and along Glen Street thinking only of being alone. Soon enough she found herself in the Valley, which glowed with a vivid beauty against grey skies. Every child who dwelt in the bustle of Ingleside had claimed a secret home here. It was not only the extraordinary loveliness that spoke to Nan, but the leafy rooms and dappled carpets which gave her a place to lie still and peer up in wonder into green haloed heavens.

Yet it did not answer Nan today. Perhaps because she really did not want to be alone, but more likely because there was a particular question she was not yet ready to ask. She headed for home, unpinning her hat and rolling Jerry's sweater inside it in anticipation of the knowing looks she would receive were she to wear it. And was utterly unsurprised when she spied two stockinged feet peek from the hammock that hung from the big scotch pine which bordered the gardens of Ingleside.

"Catching up on some shut-eye, are you? You old scallywag!" she said, tweaking at green and red argyle toes.

"Not so much of the _old_, Nan, if you don't mind," was the chuckling reply.

"Father!_" _Nan cried, peering into the hammock and discovering her father snoozing in his shirt sleeves, his curly hair poking above the newspaper lying over his face. "I- I thought you were Walter! I'm sorry I disturbed you. I heard you had quite a night last night."

"Fascinating, actually," Gilbert replied, tossing the paper aside, revealing hazel eyes that sparked bright even though they had not been closed for more than an hour together since yesterday. "Two feet presentation. One from each twin. I ought to thank you and your sister for not causing your mother such difficulties. Though I suppose you make up for it in _other_ ways... The problem, the real difficulty, was that one of the babies was almost in the transverse position-"

"I haven't the slightest clue what you are talking about, you know."

"Hmmm, do you not?" Gilbert said, he sat up and swivelled his legs to the grass, and motioned to his daughter to sit by him. She gave him a diffident smile as she perched on the hammock and he kissed the top of her head -one he knew very well held an unquenchable curiosity for 'ologies' and 'isms' whatever she might pretend. "Don't hide your light under the bushel, Nan. Never liked that in a girl."

"I only meant that I'm not Di." It was something of household joke that Gilbert was rather partial toward the redheads in his house.

"Lucky for you, I'd say."

"So you _know?_" Nan burst out, "I swear Susan sleeps with one eye open!"

"Don't be so quick to discount your mother's powers of observation. She knows when every child of ours is tucked up safe or not," Gilbert said, stifling a yawn.

Poor Dads, Nan thought, observing his rumpled brown curls and the pale purple shadows under his eyes. He should be in bed himself. "I'll leave you to your nap." She patted his hand and went to stand up but her father would not let her go.

"What is it, Nan-o-mine?" he asked her, gently. She fell back against his shoulder on hearing the dear little name of her girlhood. Oh, what was wrong with her -was she going to cry again?

"Oh, nothing... And everything."

"Could you narrow it down for me just a little," he smiled, "my brain's not so sharp at the moment."

Nan wondered if her father could _ever_ understand how she felt. He waited, and she saw he would keep on waiting; saw such a patient, generous love in his eyes, she thought perhaps he might.

"It's just that, well... there is someone very dear to me -and _everyone_ seems to think we should be together. And now I think that he -I mean this _someone- _does too..."

So, ho! thought Gilbert, It has finally come. He did not expect any daughter of Anne's would be easily won, and would have far more to say to the boy so fortunate -or unfortunate- as to fall for one of them. Yet he knew he must try to find the words for his girl.

"And you don't, I take it?"

"I -I, I don't know. How am I to make up my mind when the _world_ wants to make it up for me. And now, he -this friend- might be _leaving. _Maybe even _soon_, maybe even _forever_, and I feel as though... I don't know. Should I hurry up and make my mind up _now_, before he leaves? Or wait until he comes back -but then what if he _never_ comes back?"

Gilbert's heart was filled with a powerful ache. His own choices had seemed so simple in comparison and he wished, even as he knew he should accept this bend in the road and go down it gracefully, that his children might be spared such an unknowable fate. "That is for Providence to determine."

"Providence. You think this war is Providential?" Nan was unable to hide the skepticism in her voice.

"I think that God has a plan for you, and for me... and for Jerry Meredith," her father said, patting her nose.

"So you _knew_ I meant Jerry. I suppose_ you_ think we ought be together too!"

"Nan Blythe," said Gilbert, beginning to laugh, "You already _are_ together. Always, everywhere, and in _every_ way that counts."

"We _are?_"

"Don't you know that?"

"I -I suppose I do."

"You can't suppose it, Nan. You have to know it."

"I'm... I'm afraid, Father." Nan looked down. She hated not to be strong for him, she knew he wanted his children to be bright and spirited -blithe! But right at this moment it seemed too much to expect of her. Even if she was ashamed to say so, she was afraid.

"We are all afraid, Nan." She looked up abruptly at her father's face to see if he was teasing -sometimes one couldn't be sure with Father. But he wasn't. Nan saw the look in his eyes and she knew he meant it. Her mouth fell open. "I was terribly afraid," he continued, "when I first asked your mother to marry me."

"But you and Mother are so _wonderful_ together. I can't imagine you ever _not_ being together. You _belong_ together, you were _made_ for each other -_everybody_ says so!"

The irony of his daughter's words did not go unnoticed, but Gilbert was not so unwise as to point this out to her. "And since when did your mother care for what anybody else said?" he chuckled, then went quiet. "I just kept loving her anyway."

"You think -you think that... Jerry will love _me_ anyway?"

"Yes, darling, I do. I should warn you, though, it might not look like love for a while."

"What does love look like?" Nan's brow furrowed, and she grasped her father's hand tightly.

"You're pretending not to know things again, I think. I would hope you know very well what love looks like. I should feel I had not done my duty as your father if you didn't."

"Well, it changes, love changes, Father-"

"No, Nan," he wrapped arm about her and squeezed affectionately. _"How_ you love might change, but loving -true love- never changes."

Nan tucked her hair behind her ear then lay her hand upon her maroon skirts, studying one finger in particular. Imagining a ring of betrothal twinkling there, imagining what it would be like to see it every day knowing Jerry would never add wedding band to it.

"What I meant is everything I love is everything I am afraid to lose."

Gilbert looked at her now, not as a father gazes at his little girl, but as a fellow traveller on this road they had to take.

"Yes," he said, his throat felt tight but he kept his voice strong for her. "I think you have it about right."

"So what am I to do?" She fell against him again and let herself cry as she had wanted to in that awful moment on the bridge. Gilbert held her closely, stroking her hair down her back and she breathed in the lovely, familiar smell that was her father -an irreplaceable blend of apple and grass, soap and ether. The hammock swayed them gently and Nan began to wish that none she loved would ever have to leave. "What shall I do, what can any of us do?" she wept.

Her father released her and gently wiped her tears. "Love anyway," he said.

**… … …**

from the Tolkien quote, "You can only come to morning through the shadows."

**Thank you all for reading this, and for your incredibly encouraging reviews.  
><strong>


	9. Bells

_As always, with love and gratitude to L.M.M. -everything is hers, only this idea is mine  
><em>

**Bells**

**T**

_In which the Blythe's last golden day ticks away; and Anne's clock causes Gilbert some alarm.  
><em>

_**Ingleside, Glen St Mary ~luncheon, that same day  
><strong>_

Anne looked about her with a familiar bliss, at all her darlings sitting around their fine old dining table. Little conversations ticking away between and across each other. Hands reaching for butter, then the basket of bread, now hunting for the tiny bone handled knife, which -if not hiding under the enthusiastic flower display made by Rilla- was usually with Shirley, whose bottomless appetite meant he polished off three or four rolls between soup and dessert. The cheery hubbub concerning who danced with whom -or did not- and an exuberant discussion of Kitchener, interspersed with the sounds of their beloved chairs scraping along the floorboards in order to retrieve napkins -that would be Di, whose jiggling legs often caused it to fall from her lap -or gooseberry jam for the Doctor, who liked nothing better on his fresh baked bread.

Gilbert Blythe sat at twelve o'clock and Anne at six, with Rilla at one elbow, having been placed there all those years back when she had needed minding at table, and squeezing out Shirley -who sat a chair or so up. But always next to Susan, who preferred being close to the Doctor in case the jam dish should need plumping up again. At nine o'clock was Jem -always was and would be- with Di usually nearer her father, and Walter his mother, though they would often take turn about with Nan, depending on the confidences that needed sharing. This afternoon it was Nan and Di for ten and eleven and Walter at eight. Two of the chairs that made up the set of twelve lived on either side of the walnut sideboard but one always remained with them. A little pause between the tick and the tock which nobody mentioned but everyone knew belonged to the eldest Blythe child, Joy.

Anne gazed at the balloon backed chair, its burnished mahogany upholstered in a fading mossy brocade, imagining her eldest daughter sitting there now. Would she be talking poetry with Walter, who was staring absently -or more accurately, _sleepily_- at his untouched pie? Perhaps inspiring a greater love of learning in her littlest sister, who was tapping out the melody to that Vaudeville tune the Glen youth were all mad about. Maybe she would be holding her own with her father and Jem as they pored over the latest news, or talking with Anne, herself, about her dreams, her ambitions... her sweetheart perhaps? Joy would be twenty-three by now, Anne had been engaged by then -Diana Wright a _mother_. Might it have been she could be holding her first grandchild on her knee, or warmly insisting to Joy's husband that he _must_ call her Anne?

Gilbert observed his wife across the table as she propped up her chin and stared out to the pear tree in the garden. The same candid look in her large grey eyes that she had at eleven, perched at her desk and gazing out to the Lake of Shining Waters. She even wore her hair in braids, twisted in a thick coronet about her head. His beloved queen still building her castles in the air. Though it seemed she was not quite looking out the west window -the light from which made Jem's hair glow in the afternoon sun, and his ears go pink- but at the empty chair.

Of course, Anne would be thinking of Joy today knowing that other chairs would empty soon. Each tick of the clock bringing them both closer to the time their children would leave them. Not only for Redmond nor even the ends of the earth, but to the very gates of hell. This would be a war unlike any he had studied in his history books. Not made of flying banners and regimental colours in bright formation. But a technology of death; of wire twisted into barbs, of mortars and machine guns, and rumours of another metal monstrosity. A sort of armoured landship, Jem was saying, that could break through any line and was impervious to any bullet.

"Those Huns won't know what's hit them! What division do you suppose a fellow would have to enlist in to see such a thing?"

"Fairy tale division," Shirley piped up from across the table. "Sounds like tosh. If you want cross enemy lines you should go by air-"

"Oh, to think of putting yourself in one of those unholy contraptions only to be shot at like a duck in hunting season," Susan quivered, dolloping another spoon of cream on Shirley's plate. "Thank the Lord_ you_ had the sense to be sixteen," she said to him, "you'll never get anywhere near it."

"Bang on there, Susan! Shirley's far better off at home, aren't you, little brown boy?" said Jem, and gave his little brother a teasing wave farewell.

Rather be a brown boy any day than have ears that went as red as my hair! Shirley fumed, stuffing a great wedge of pie in his mouth with the intention of giving Jem a nasty eyeful as he chomped it down. The effect was unfortunately ruined by Susan dabbing her napkin at the blueberries that dribbled down his chin.

How Joy would have laughed at them, Anne thought, longingly. Sometimes it was as though she heard it. A bell-like laugh that was lilting like Nan's, yet knowing like Di's, with the spontaneous glee of Rilla. The two of them would have shared such a look now, and Anne would have said 'Just wait till you have sons of your own!'

She looked over at Jem, imagining his chair empty too. "Why his heart burns as bright as his hair, donnit?" Mary Vance once said, and Anne had to stifle a snort when she spied little Jem's fists curling in his pockets. Knowing full well what burned in her boy right then was a desire to bop that white-eyed minx on the nose.

"But one must never _ever_ bop a girl," he told her solemnly, later that evening as she pulled the quilt up to his chin, "_even_ the Vancey sort." And though it was very wrong Anne had the clearest image of his big sister giving Mary Vance what for. What sweet relief when Jem's hazel eyes blinked their last that day, giving into sleep as only a child can so that she might give into the laughter inside her.

That impish delight, the one she had spent her motherhood stifling and releasing in equal measure, began to elude Anne now.

That morning she had telephoned to Avonlea hoping to find some way to speak of the dread that was growing inside her, and share her fears with her oldest friend. But on hearing Diana Wright shrieking excitedly Anne had neither the opportunity nor the slightest inclination. Ascertaining among the squeals that Fred Jr had just become a father and that her son-in-law, Ike, was about to motor them all to The Pines to meet the bundle of joy!

"Oh, I -oh, Anne, I didn't mean..." Diana said, breathlessly. "When I've _always_ been so mindful not to use that expression. I don't know what I was thinking, darling. Forgive me won't you, I'm just so-"

"There is nothing to forgive, Diana dear. Every baby _is_ a joy. It seems only yesterday I met your little Fred-"

"I _know!_ And how I'd wanted a daughter so I could name her for you. Speaking of which, my _not _so small," -here she eyed her daughter's burgeoning belly- "Anne-Cordelia is tugging at my arm. We really _must_ go! But we'll talk soon."

"Yes, yes, please give them all my love, won't you? Especially Mabel and Fred and their bundle of-"

Diana had rung off and Anne held onto the receiver unable to move, as tears -she knew not from happiness or sorrow- tumbled from her eyes. Fred a father! He couldn't go now. They wouldn't let _fathers_ enlist would they? Diana's Jack would likely go, he and Jem talked of little else. But surely she and Diana would be spared sending _two_ sons into the dark unknown.

Anne stared at the chair again, the velvet brocade was wearing away. Perhaps Nan was right, it was time to think of new coverings. Yet each chair wore its years like a story, one could never replace it with anything half so meaningful. When Rilla was gone she would see to it. Yes, by that time there were bound to be countless in-laws and grandchildren, they would have to buy entirely new furniture if they ever hoped to seat them all. Let her think of it after her baby had gone.

"Mother, Mother?" that baby asked her, "Susan says I am not to play piano after dinner as Father will be needing a nap? Mightn't I, Mother dearwums? It could be like a lullaby."

Poor love, Anne thought as she beheld her freckled little fay. Of course she would be wanting to chase the oppressive spirit from the house. Though Rilla's attempts to muddle out the chords to _Gilbert the Filbert _might put yet a third child in their father's bad books.

She was thinking of a suitable reply when bells trilled starkly up the hall. There was such a silence, as though the Blythes had never heard the telephone before. All listening with an attentive ear to the sound that meant Ingleside -for one brief ring, one long, and then two in quick succession.

"Oh ...Yew Cottage," Jem said to no one in particular.

Well, thank goodness for that. Susan sighed, and picked up her fork. That was the last thing the Doctor needed, _more_ twins! Or broken arms or burst something else's. Surely these people might schedule their catastrophes so as not to coincide with Saturday luncheon. But the telephone had done its work. The conversation became a distracted hum, the clatter a lone chink of the butter knife missing the butter. Susan broke a corner of her pie into smaller and smaller pieces and the bells began again...

"That's The Laurels," then, "Treetops, that one," and "Fairview."

No one even pretended to eat now, listening out as again and again the homes of Jem and Walter's school-mates were summoned. Until horribly, chillingly... one short bell, one long, two short.

Jem was at the phone before Susan could put her fork down. "Righto," they heard him say from the hall. "Tonight."

Gilbert looked across the table at his wife and prayed that he had not gone as white as she had.

**… … …**

There was no light in the bedroom when Gilbert returned to Ingleside that night. So, she was still upset. From the first days of their marriage Anne had fallen into the habit of leaving a lamp lit for him. In all their years together she never forgot -unless, that is, she meant her husband to feel forgot.

He kicked off his shoes and perched on the bed, working at the knot of his tie. Anne lay uncommonly still under the quilt and he sensed immediately that she was awake.

"Can I light the lamp a moment, Anne-girl?" he whispered. When she was silent he continued, "I just need to jot down a few notes while they occur to me."

Anne sat up abruptly, throwing the silver match case at his head as she did so. It sailed over his shoulder and onto the floor. "Don't let me stop you, _Doctor_ Blythe."

Gilbert winced. Well, at least she was talking to him, the only thing he loathed more than sarcasm was the cold shoulder. He picked up the box and ignited the wick of the cranberry glass lamp by her side of the bed. Anne rolled away as he neared her, tugging at her blanket viciously. And there it is_, _Gilbert thought, dully, as cold as she could make it.

He went to his chest of drawers and brought out one of the notebooks he kept with his starched handkerchiefs and crumpled keepsakes from their children. Instinctively, Anne turned back to look at him. He only ever wrote in these to record someone's birth -or death. What had happened since he left this afternoon? Mary-Dawn Bunt said that she thought her boy might have broken his finger, no-one's life had been in danger. It was because the accident had been so slight that Anne had flown from his study in tears. Their own son had just announced he would be going to war and Gilbert had given his wife all of three minutes before grabbing his bag and leaving Anne to her grief. He had been gone for almost _eight_ hours. Eight hours for a broken finger! When he didn't arrive in time to see Jem leave for the seven o'clock train to Charlottetown Anne's grief grew into a slow burning anger. And now Gilbert had finally arrived and the first thing he wanted to do was _more_ work. Oh, that she had a thousand silver cases to aim at his insensitive, uncaring head!

He didn't match that description, however. His shoulders were hunched and he rubbed his brows with a trembling hand. Anne was kneeling by his side in the next moment. Though he would not cry, his eyes, she saw, had tears in them.

"Gil, what has happened, don't tell me Winston Bunt died of a broken finger?"

Gilbert closed the notebook. It looked for a moment as though it would go the way of the matchbox, before it fell to the floor with a hopeless thud. "No -no. He's fine, he's... You know how Mrs Bunt panics."

"Yes. I do," Anne said, sitting back, unable to hide the wounded look in her eyes. "That's why I was so furious when you left like that. I needed you today, Gilbert-"

"I know. I need you too, Anne -no I mean it, I do," he continued, when he saw the doubtful look on her face, "it was only that the Bunts live next door to the Sinclairs, and I wanted to check on the new twins... Their birth you know, it was complicated and drawn out, and on top of that they were early-"

"But it all went fine. This morning you were strutting round proud as you like that you had managed to bring them safely into the world." Even as Anne said these words she knew what Gilbert was about to say and felt her own eyes prick with tears.

"Glory died, Anne. Their little girl died and it could be that Victory dies as well. I -I can't stop it, I tried... I have to go back there in a few hours -they made me go home."

"They probably want to be alone, darling. You remember what it was like when Joy-"

"Anne, I _knew._" He stared hard into her eyes as if daring her to look away. "The moment our little girl was born I _knew_ we were going to lose her... I've never been able to shake that memory. When I saw the shadow of death on our child's face-"

Anne knew it, too. She had seen its cold, unfeeling shadow upon another face. Walter came me so close to dying last Christmas she thought his time had come. Yet he had lived_. _The disease itself became a sort of blessing, because of the typhoid there was no way he would be strong enough to serve in the war. Still the shadow lurked in Anne's heart. However much she wanted to fling it from her with every word of war it did grow. And now it had come for Jem.

"-these twins, I thought they had a real chance," Gilbert was saying, as much to himself as to Anne. He went on to relate the problems with Glory's breathing, and how Victory, though stronger, was battling the same plight.

All the while Anne was removing his tie, unbuttoning his shirt, and rubbing his tight, stiff shoulders and neck until he fell back, limply, onto their bed. He looked at her as she lay on the pillow next to him clutching his hands to her. He loosened one and stroked her face. Lately it had become thinner, paler, her grey eyes even more luminous.

"I managed to get to the station, Anne, but the boys had already embarked... I couldn't see them -I don't know if they saw me."

"Don't worry about that now, my love. Jem assured me they'd be back in a couple of days. We have time, we have time-"

Anne gave into her tears, finally able to release all that hurt and fear into Gilbert's chest after holding it inside for those strange, bleak hours since the call had come. It was not for her to give into anguish, she must help her children to bear their troubles not add to them. And though the sea promised some solace Anne ignored its call, and lingered about Ingleside waiting for them to come to her. Instead, Jem, Nan and Di ran over to the Manse to be with Faith and Jerry. Susan clucked over Shirley all afternoon, as Gertrude did Rilla, and Walter disappeared entirely. It seemed that none of her children needed her anymore.

Gilbert stroked her hair down her shoulders and smoothed it over her nightgown. Within moments he felt his wife nestling closely into him, pressing her hips against his, and recognised immediately what she wanted. He had not been her lover all these years without knowing her as well as knew himself, and he sighed deeply, feeling that nothing would soothe and fill him so well as being with his wife. It had been more than a month since they made love and he felt himself responding to her now like a lad half his age. Wordlessly, he began to remove his trousers, peeling off his socks and tossing them into the air as he asked her, off-handedly-

"Is it safe?"

"No," Anne replied, quietly, casting her nightgown away and wrapping the quilt about them both -his mouth already seeking her breasts. He kissed her in the silken plain between them and looked up with a smile.

"Ah, never mind, Anne-girl." He didn't quite mean it. Right at this moment he wanted nothing more than be lost to her, to forget and let go. But not tonight. Though the chance of making her pregnant must be negligible it was still not one he was willing to take.

"I don't mind, Gil. In fact," he noticed her face begin to flush, "I don't want you to pull away... before you-"

"What-"

"I want another baby, Gil-"

"Anne! You're 48!"

"Age makes no difference. As far as that is concerned I'm the same as I was at fifteen... I could have another baby, I _know_ my body-"

Gilbert sat up as a bolt went through him. This wasn't some impulsive desire, Anne had clearly been considering this for some time. "Where is this coming from. _A baby?_ Is this because of Jem leaving, because Rilla is growing up?"

Someone else occurred to him. Joy.

When Joy had died Anne wanted to become pregnant again immediately, and it was Gilbert -Gilbert who craved and adored his wife- that had to find the strength and the will to tell her they should wait; not only until her body had healed, but her heart. Anne, in her fragile state felt even more desolate. She, who had loved solitude, who had grown up dependent only on herself, became terrified of being alone. Making love with her husband would help her feel whole again and now he was depriving her of that -and the child they would make. He didn't want her anymore. She was broken.

In truth they both were. The two of them had to find another way, another language, to love each other. Until Gilbert knew in his heart that the fire and dew that was his own sweet girl lived within her once again. On that day they made Jem.

Gilbert stared at her, saw those eyes glowing and hungry. The want he felt was maddening but so was the doubt. He stayed the hand that snaked down to his waist and held it firmly in his. "Talk to me, Anne."

"I don't know -I don't know, Gil." Anne turned from him and stared up at the ceiling. "Sometimes I feel... as if there is another child that wants to come to us."

Gilbert touched her lightly on her chin and made her look at him again. "Anne, Joy is gone, she's gone-" he said, unable to hide the concern in his voice.

"I know that, I know it. She stopped being my baby long ago...And now little Jem is leaving -he doesn't even need our permission anymore. That blessed boy healed us when Joy died. And I realised when we were so close to losing Walter that I wouldn't know how to heal if he died too... Now the war has come and I can't protect them. I feel so helpless and I crave that feeling... of a child growing inside me again."

"Anne we can't, you know we can't-"

"Just tonight, Gil, please don't pull away from me." She knelt up beside him, so close he could feel the lengths of her hair brush against his bare skin. "I vow, I promise you, I will never ask again. Just while we say goodbye to our son, let me have this possibility to hold onto."

"But chances are-"

"Providence has been good to me. It brought me to Green Gables, let you live. If it blesses us with another baby..."

Her eyes burned with longing and Gilbert found himself remembering the way she looked at him the first time they shared a bed together. He lowered himself onto his elbow and she began stroking his cheek, tracing a finger over his nose and lips, then down his chest- _No. _He had sworn after Rilla never again.

"We've been blessed with many babies, Anne. You nearly died bringing Shirley into the world. When you fell pregnant again it was the longest nine months of my life."

"Just tonight." Anne said, weaving her fingers in the short silver curls at his temples. "And I will never ask you again. I'll start wearing red flannel underwear and embroidering christening gowns for all the grandchildren we've got to look forward to-"

"You hate embroidery," Gilbert snorted.

"I love you."

"Wicked woman. You'll say anything."

"And _do_ anything-"

The 'phone rang now, one short, one long, and two short trills.

"Victory," they said at once.

Gilbert had his trousers up before the bell rang out a second time and hastened down the stairs. He found Anne buttoning up her nightgown when he returned to their room. He plucked her fingers away and unbuttoned her once more.

"What -are you coming back to bed?" she said. "That wasn't the Sinclairs?"

"The Wests, actually," Gilbert replied, wriggling out of his underwear and into his wife's arms, "They're trying to track down Ken. Apparently he went with the boys to Charlottetown. The last train back to the Glen has been and gone and he hasn't turned up."

"But you have."

"So you see."

"I do love you, Gilbert Blythe."

"Hmm," he said, hotly, "you'd better show me how much, I think. You've got from now until that cursed 'phone rings again."

"You know I never could resist a challenge," Anne laughed -how long since he had heard her laugh that way- and she grabbed him, playfully, pulling him into her.

It was wondrous to give into impulse, to throw caution away with the matches and nightgowns and socks. Just please, please_, _he thought, as he lay another kiss on the ticklish skin on her ribs, let the only thing that rings tonight be her laughter in my ear.

**… … …**


	10. No Man's Land

_This chapter features graphic war imagery, but nothing that L.M. Montgomery has not mentioned herself. As ever everything is hers, only this idea is mine._

_-special acknowledgement of the story, But I don't know who you are, by The Peace for helping Walter Blythe make sense to me._

**No Man's Land  
><strong>

**T**

_In which Walter is lost in dreams; and Ken wakes up.  
><em>

**_Ingleside, in the small hours of August 6th, 1914_**

The rifle is heavy in his arms and his fingers slip and shake. He is afraid to hold onto it, afraid of how it feels in his hands, though this is nothing to the fear he has of letting it go. His fingers tighten round the gun-barrel and he steps into darkness, pointing the bayonet outward as if he means it.

Others are wading through the mud and falling where they stand but nothing touches him. One boy falls in a heap to his right, he keeps walking. Another man crumples up at his feet, he walks on.

He reaches it now, a thick grey cut in the earth where young men cower with their rifles dropped and hands held high. They have faces like his brothers, like his friends, and their eyes are wide with terror. Not because of the weapon he carries. Because of his face. He is unbearably beautiful, with the shining grey eyes of an angel.

They fall to their knees and beg, "Muss es sein? Muss es sein?"

He stabs them all. He does not feel the weight of the rifle, he does not know where his arm stops and the blade begins. He pierces each one to the heart and they groan and murmur, sweat and plead as they fall in a pile at his feet.

"Muss es sein?" they cry out, "Muss es sein?"

"Es muss sein!" he screams at them, pushing the blade into their bodies again and again and again. "Es muss sein. Es muss sein. Es muss sein..."

"Walt? -Walter-"

Walter had the strangest sensation of being pulled into the world, and when he awoke there were wide grey eyes staring back at him. It was like being sliced open to see those eyes and he backed away and fell to the floor.

"Walter, it was a- Walter, are you quite alright? It was a dream, you were having a dream."

Walter rubbed his wrist which had taken the brunt of the fall, and noticed the soft braided rug under him. His palms were damp and he wiped them, before shakily standing up. Pulling at the night-shirt that stuck to his chest as though hating the feel of it touching him.

Ken rocked to his knees and slipped from the bed, approaching him like a small boy to a frightened animal. "Let me help you," he said, grasping at the hem of Walter's night-shirt and attempting to peel it off.

"What are you doing?" Walter said, staggering back in a panic. His heel struck hard against a chest of drawers that sat in a nook by the fireplace, and he stared at it with the look of a man who does not know where he is.

Yesterday there had been sketches and lithographs pinned to the chimney breast. Ink pots with candle ends, flowers and books crammed along the mantle. Walter had removed them all that morning, restoring them to the sprawling attic room he had once shared with Jem. Shirley was less motivated. Of course, returning to the little room would mean one less flight of stairs to manage whilst carrying all his banbury cakes -and one less mouth to share them with. But the thought of having to box up all his belongings took the shine off that. And when the call came for Jem that afternoon Walter, too, lost heart. By evening both boys found themselves tucked up under the eaves, and the apple-leaf quilts, in the attic. The little room remaining a strange blank -a no man's land- neither had wanted to sleep in.

Not that Walter could sleep. Though his body was weighed with exhaustion, he thrummed with beats of adrenalin which pumped through him relentlessly. He stared up at the papered ceiling, tried writing by the smallest glow of the lamp, even counted Shirley's breaths. Jem said he found it comforting -Walter wanted to shake him awake, demanding to know how he could sleep so easily. When he heard the scraping sound coming from downstairs he was at Shirley's bedside the next moment.

"Shir?"

"Mmmm, wha'..." his brother rumbled, groggily.

"Shir, listen, did you hear that -listen... That noise? Someone's trying to get in."

"_Out_ prob'ly. Jem's always sneakin' off-"

"Jem's not here, remember? Listen... there it goes again, like someone trying not to make a noise-"

"They're doin' a better job than you. Go back to bed, Walt, I gotta get up in a few hours. Me 'n Carl gonna hunt for Whopper trout-" Shirley yawned, pulling his quilt over his head. "Besides," he said, from under the covers, "Monday'd have a fit if it was a stranger. Gotta be someone we know."

Someone we know_. _Walter grabbed the lamp and tip-toed downstairs.

"Ken?"

"Good evening, old thing," Ken grinned, stupidly. He was unlacing his shoes on the edge of the bed which sagged pitifully under his weight. Far more than it had ever sagged for him, Walter noticed. He carefully shut the door and wedged a blanket into the gap between it and the floor as a measure against any noise -and Susan Baker, who slept across the hall.

"Thought this was your room," Ken continued, as though it was the Blythes and not his own fine self who had displayed such blatant bad manners. He pulled off his tie and threw it at Walter before falling onto the bed, the bed-springs protesting noisily.

"Shhh," Walter whispered, sitting himself beside his friend with a practiced manoeuvre, and pulling his nightshirt over his knees.

"Damned inconvenient having such a whiny bed, I bet-"

"Not at all, that squeak was good company once," said Walter, setting the lamp on the floor, a knowing half smile on his lips as he recognised the faint tang of alcohol on Ken's breath. The keepers at the coach house wouldn't half miss him when he left. And they weren't the only ones.

He certainly had a way, this Kenneth Ford, and didn't he know it, flexing his limbs idly and making himself at home. Of course, the buttons of Ken's shirt would strain over his chest when he stretched like that, Walter only noticed it because his own muscles had wasted away with the fever. No one would think it to look at him now but there had been a time when Ken had met his match in Walter Blythe.

They had been seventeen when he finally managed to pin Ken to the ground. But there had been no sense of victory and he didn't crow the way he thought he might. He felt stricken, panicked -they weren't little boys anymore- and got off him without a word. When Ken clung to his ankles and tried to take him down Walter shook him off coldly, and said, 'Don't you think it's time we grew up.'

That year he left the midnight swims and the wrestling to his brothers, and wrote sixty-two poems to Rosamond. He and Ken would always have writing, and Walter discovered in writing he grew, in writing he mattered.

This didn't matter, Ken lying about in his bed. Yet his body would keep thrumming. His heart felt like it would fill his throat and he pulled at the collar of his night-shirt. It's just the war, it's Faith, it's Jem, it's ...it's... It is not this. This was nothing, this was fatigue, exhaustion... He was just so tired, he was so horribly tired.

"So, Mr Ford" he muttered, laying his head by his friend, the bed moaning as he shifted himself closer, "are you going to tell me what you're doing here?"

Not that it mattered, somehow nothing mattered now, and he closed his eyes and let Ken's voice go through him...

**... ... ...**

He felt sliced open, wet with blood, looking at Ken as if he was afraid of him. More than that, as if he hated him.

"I -I came through the window remember... You were having a dream, Walt, just a dream... I'm trying to help you -you're soaking wet." Ken made an effort to keep his words calm. Though he had to admit if someone interrupted them he would have felt more than a little relief, wishing he had more to give Walter than the usual careless quip. "I know very well what you look like, you know, you needn't act so prim and proper-"

"You think I'm prim- that I'm some prissy milksop?"

"What? No-"

"Because I write, because I dream, because I sweat?" he hissed.

"Everybody does that, Walter, don't think you're so special-" Ken attempted a laugh which dissolved immediately when he saw the contempt on Walter's face. His body, however, looked exhausted, trembling wretchedly under his sweat-drenched shirt. Ken placed his hands round Walter's arms and held them tight. "There's nothing to be ashamed of, Walt. It was a dream, just a dream. It's not real."

"Not real," said Walter, dully, the knots in his body slowly dissolving under Ken's fingers.

"No," Ken breathed with relief, shaking his head in the manner of a tutting aunt. "Now be reasonable and take this off," and swiftly pulled at Walter's night-shirt. It came off in one clean movement like a rabbit being skinned. He looks like one, too, Ken thought, when he saw Walter's body, he looks fifteen not twenty.

Walter turned abruptly, rummaging about in his chest of drawers and throwing on a clean night-shirt. Ken went back to the bed, settling on it the careful way Walter had. Though he could not keep in a small snicker as he watched his friend pull out a pair of underpants and shuffle into them awkwardly.

"You needn't wear them just because I am," he joked.

"That's all you're wearing," Walter said, "I don't recall you arriving at the window so sparely dressed."

"You were so infernally hot, it was like sleeping with a human furnace," Ken replied, he lay back, warily, and peered up at the ceiling. The pillow was damp against his neck, and he said, almost casually, as if they were discussing the comet shaped crack above him, "You -you are quite well, aren't you, Walt. The fever, I mean."

"Why, are you afraid you might catch something from me?"

Walter's eyes stared into Ken as if he wanted to bore holes all through him. Ken suddenly felt ridiculous sprawled out the way he was, and he reached for the trousers he had peeled off earlier and proceeded to untangle them. "Why are you so angry with me?" he asked, shoving his foot down his pant-leg. There was a familiar sharp pain as he flexed his foot, and he grimaced.

"Why are you _here?_" Walter snapped, "Surely you should be stealing through Rilla's window not mine."

"Hmmm, I might just do that." The bed jeered as Ken stood up but it wasn't funny anymore.

"You _wouldn't._"

Walter's eye's widened with hurt, disappointment and -was it, could it really be- jealousy? Ken had seen that look in any number of other men. But never in Walter. He was the least possessive, most decent hearted person he knew. Even with Faith he had never, not once, wanted to win that girl for his own, only to know what it was to love her. Ken gave up the buttoning of his shirt and rubbed his hands over his eyes in frustration. "Of course I wouldn't," he said.

Not for the first time he thought of Rilla Blythe curled up in the room next door, and all that bravado and banter eluded him. What was it about this girl that pierced him to the heart? Yes she was gorgeous and spirited and sweet, but she was more than that... No. She was_ less_. She had yet to put that armour on, the one that weighed Ken down and kept him on a path he no longer cared about. What had she said that night on the sandbar, that he would have his chance to make it right again? Ken decided he would try, he would speak as plainly as he could. He swallowed hard and looked at Walter.

"Why are you so set on pushing us together?"

"Ken, you can hardly take your eyes off her."

Ken winced. It was true, yet it wasn't the truth. Walter was hiding something and Ken hated to see it. As we all hate in others what we hate in ourselves. "You're right, I should go," he tucked in his shirtfront, absently, and smoothed back his hair.

"To see Rilla?"

"Back to the Wests." Ken said, wearily. "I'm sorry I came, Walter. Believe what you like about your sister. I came here to see you."

He could not deny it was Rilla he'd been thinking of when he came here, and it was her room he looked up at longingly. But he never dreamed of throwing stones at her window -possibly because he half expected Gertrude Oliver to catch them in her teeth and spit them back at him. Instead he slouched pathetically on the Ingleside veranda, lost, ashamed and yes, the tiniest bit tipsy. And it was Walter he wanted then, it was Walter who would understand.

"Who else should I go to? Mim, Ethel Reese?" his own anger beginning to show itself. "You know, I never wanted that train to stop, tonight. When the boys got off at Charlottetown I would have given almost anything to go on and be taken far away... It was a mistake to go along with Jem and Jerry, I thought if I could tie myself to them that I could somehow be a part of it... But they're in another world now -and I can't follow. A stupid lame boy who can't catch up to that damned Piper."

Walter smiled, it was rumpled and unsure but it was there. "Please don't go," he said, simply.

Ken looked at his friend, amazed that the hot rush to leave had so suddenly deserted him. His ankle gave way and he dropped hard onto the bed, they both shared a look as the bed-springs screeched. "No, I don't suppose I'm going anywhere," he said, as much to himself as to Walter. "You'll have to put up with me tonight. I can go up to Jem's bed, if you like-"

"No, I mean, don't go... back to Toronto. Stay here for the remainder of the summer," Walter sat by Ken's side and fell back against the pillow, staring up at the comet still making its way across the ceiling. "The thought of all those well meaning Glen folk looking at me pityingly and thinking that I want to go with Jem. If you were here with me..."

Ken lay back next to him and listened, trying to envisage such a summer; long, hot and empty. Just the two of them and Rilla. Just Rilla and nothing else... He knew what would happen and felt his body burn again at the thought of her in the next room. He rolled away from Walter and curled his knees to his chest.

"What say we talk tomorrow, Walt, I am scuppered after your damned capers-"

"It was just a bad dream," Walter yawned, pulling the quilt over them both. "We all have them, you said so yourself-"

"A _bad_ dream?" Ken turned to look at him briefly. "Funny, I thought you'd be mad for the 16th string quartet-"

"So I am."

"You were reciting the motif, you know, while you were asleep. 'Muss es sein', you said, as clear as you like. 'Muss es sein. Muss es sein...' Great God, Walter Blythe," Ken yawned, nestling his head by his friend, "only you would have a nightmare about Beethoven."

Walter watched him, absorbed wholly as he had been the night before; watching the way Ken closed his eyes, the way his body surrendered so easily _to _sleep_._ It did not seem strange, only natural and right that he should kiss him goodnight once more. His mouth brushed Ken's cheek, it was the softest, most fleeting of touches. The rough feel of his skin against Walter's lips like a match being struck.

He left the bed and went back to his old room.

**… … …**

_This is from one of Beethoven's last compositions. There is a motif throughout the work which Beethoven described as asking the question 'Muss es sein?/Must it be?' And then answering it with 'Es muss sein/ It must be'._


	11. Past Imperfect

_As always, everything is L.M.M's -only this idea is mine._

**Past Imperfect_  
><span>_**

_In which Shirley collides with Walter; Walter butts heads with Di; and Di is floored by Carl and Shirley  
><em>

_**Ingleside, dawn, August 6th, 1914**_

Walter put his hands to his lips, still remembering the touch of one boy when he collided with another.

"Aw-" Shirley exclaimed, rubbing the toe that had struck Walter's shin. "Why aren't you carrying a lamp?" Walter looked up at him as if to say that he was a fine one to talk, and leaned against the stairwell to nurse his own bruise. "And before you say anything," he continued, "you took _ours_ with you, remember?"

_The light_. It was still under the window in the little room. Walter wondered briefly if he should go back, then slid down the wall and dropped on a step.

"Gee, Walt, didn't think I bumped you that hard-"

"I'm only tired-"

Shirley gave an exasperated humph, "Got more sleep than I did, I bet. After you sallied off Di burst in looking for you-"

_Di? _Walter frowned, and then sank further, remembering that his sister had given him one of their signals at the table last night. Whilst trying to coax Nan to eat more than a morsel of supper Di sent him a furtive look. Pulling on her ear and pointing upstairs; meaning tonight after everyone's asleep, then we can talk.

When their eldest brother announced his decision to enlist Walter knew that Di would have wanted nothing more than to follow him into the Valley and disappear for an hour or two. But Nan's anguish, the sound she had made as though part of her body had been ripped from her, there was nothing Di could do but give her sister something of herself. Yet when Walter spotted her linking arms with Jem and Nan as they made their way to the Manse he felt nothing so much as relief. He'd been pounded from all sides since the Piper had sounded his call, there had been no time to sleep let alone think. But as he lay in the bough of the chestnut tree his thoughts were not of Faith, or even Jem, and he definitely had not been thinking of Di. He hadn't considered her at all, he realised, and lately he'd been looking for reasons _not_ to be where she was.

He bit his lip and shook his head impatiently. He was doing it _again,_ thinking of other things when he should be thinking of Di. Clearly Di had been thinking about him. Was it possible she had kept looking for him, too?

"If you've finished lounging about in the poet style. Carl said he would wait, but you know Carl," Shirley said, nudging Walter in order to squeeze by. He descended two steps before receiving a sharp tug on the aviator's scarf he had taken to wearing.

"Did you tell her -did you tell Di where I was?" Walter asked him.

"Tell her yourself," Shirley replied, "she's still there waiting for you."

**… … …**

Di curled up behind the curtains of the window seat, the same one little Jem had fallen asleep on when Susan thought he'd run away to get tattooed. It was a perfect place to hide, the only place in Ingleside where one could be invisible. Though perhaps it was no longer necessary.

She had never felt more superfluous to this family. Each one caught up in their own tempest -excepting Shirley of course, one could always rely on good sense from him. She wished she'd thought to stay by his side yesterday and be spoiled by Susan. She'd been horribly hungry all day -the effects of all that champagne she supposed. When everyone else picked at their plates during dinner Di had to stop herself snatching their uneaten pies.

It had been hellish at the Manse. Di knew that her place was by Nan's side, but hadn't reckoned on Nan wanting to be with Faith. Of course she would. The two of them 'now shared the distinction of being broken hearted sweethearts' -as Mrs Norman Douglas put it. It seemed impossible _that _woman could be sister to an angel like Rosemary Meredith. For where she was all milk and honey, Ellen Douglas was better taken with your nose held and your eyes shut. Truth to tell, every Blythe would quietly confess to wanting to box her between her beetle brows at least once. But yesterday Di had to contain a snide little laugh, wondering if Nan wasn't luxuriating in her agony just the teensiest bit much, if Faith wasn't rather too aware of how her bright eyes and fervent expression made her even more beautiful.

These were the bitter thoughts which filled her head as she emptied every shelf in the Meredith's pantry for the busybodies and doomsayers who invaded the Manse that afternoon. Rosemary excused Nan after her tears splashed over yet another plate of curried egg sandwiches, and that was all the excuse Faith needed to get herself out of the kitchen, too. Una merely doubled her efforts. The way she kept slicing and buttering, brewing and boiling, never once taking a bite for herself. Di wished just once that Una wouldn't anticipate the trilling of the kettle's whistle so that she might scream aloud without anyone noticing.

Not until she returned to Ingleside could Di breathe again. It wasn't the thought of home so much as the thought of Walter that comforted her. The evening had been so fraught. Mother seemed to hum with an unexpressed fury, though this had been more to do with Dads than the war. Di knew the feeling and could have done with being wrapped in her father's arms herself. In the end it only seemed right that it was Di who cosseted her sister, encouraging her to take one more spoon of soup, brushing her hair over her pillow as she sang little nothings of the sea, the moon -anything but love or death. This turned out to be trickier than she first supposed, but it felt good to have something else to bend her thoughts to.

Knowing there was someone waiting up for her made Di feel her selfishness keenly. Walter was only upstairs in the rambling attic, whereas Jerry would be going off to the other side of the world. Well, the training camp at Quebec in the foreseeable, but still. Whatever love she once felt -or fancied she felt, she could hardly remember how it felt at all- could be nothing to what Nan felt for Jerry Meredith. What Faith felt for Jem. _Their _boys were going. For all she knew _other_ boys might never get near it. But she did not know. Not that she had a right to. But it would ease her mind because it hurt. It hurt to hold it in, her own insignificant fears.

It didn't seem possible that Walter had forgotten her. Unfortunately for Shirley, Di's inability to comprehend the obvious meant that he was made to repeat it any number of times, and in the end had to go to the extraordinary effort of getting out of his rumpled cocoon and pulling back the covers of the bed next to him.

"Not here," he said, shortly, wondering if Di would expect him to flip the mattress up in a moment in case Walter was hiding there. He wouldn't have been entirely surprised if he was. Once, in their small days, he caught Walter trying to write upside down in order to find out if ideas would come to him quicker -all he got was a headache and a puddle of ink on the floor in the shape of a dragon that even Susan could not quell. "I know when I am bested, Mrs Doctor dear, I am not so proud as to not know that," she said, with more satisfaction than perhaps she wanted to show, as she eyed little Walter cutting strips for a new rug that now needed making.

Di stared at it, then at the floorboards, then at her feet -anywhere that would help her conceal from her little brother the tears that threatened to come.

"Silly me," she sniffed, "I must have misunderstood."

"Misheard, rather. The very first thing I said to you was check the little room-"

The little room, of course! Walter must have thought that's what she'd meant because that's where they always talked. He'd been so busy emptying it this morning that she had assumed... But no matter. She kissed Shirley hard on his sweet brown head -oof, sisters!- and tip-toed down the stairs.

**… … …**

"Morning, Di-aphanous," Walter said, lightly, nestling into the window seat. He plumped up a cushion and held it close against him, before swooping at Di for a kiss. She did not turn as he expected -well, hoped- she might and he pecked at a mouthful of her ruddy hair. "You're up early".

"That's what Nan said," Di said, looking out of the window instead of at him. "She said I was up early, when actually I hadn't even been to bed. Now you've said the same thing. I wonder why it is that no one notices what I do in this house."

"I notice, and Father-"

"When he's here," Di interjected. She pulled back strands of hair come loose from her braid so that Walter could see her small, pale face. The sky through the window was a dirty grey and it washed all the green from her eyes. "Did he punish you... for coming home so late?"

For a moment Walter thought she was asking the pear tree, whose tip-most leaves pattered against the pane. He was about to say as much then thought better of it. "Not as such, no... I mean, not yet." The most Father had given him was a cool look, the one that meant he intended Walter to stew on his misdeeds a good while longer.

"He punished me," Di said, she turned slightly but could not quite meet Walter's eyes.

"What did he say?" He was not in the least worried for himself, only wanting to kindle some sort of conversation.

"That I was forbidden from the next dance. I had to pretend that I cared, otherwise of course, he would have thought of another punishment."

"You are Di-abolical."

"Don't-"

"What, what is it, My-Di?" he reached for her hands balled up tight in her lap and touched her, briefly. Di looked at him with eyes that said, You have to ask?

"Well let us talk now." Walter scooped his knees to himself, tucking up under his nightshirt like a small boy. "So tell me true, how is it that the most glorious girl I know doesn't care if she goes to another dance?"

Di turned and faced him squarely. She thought she would burst with all the words she wanted to say to him, yet all she said was, "Do _you?_"

"What do you mean?" Walter asked her. So unexpected, so irrelevant was her question she might have been speaking another language.

"Do you _care_ if you ever go to another dance?" she asked again, but did not pause to let him answer. "You don't, do you." Walter could only shrug with incomprehension and Di looked as if she meant to box _him_ between the brows -beetled or not. "Alright, so tell _me_ true. Did you ever want to dance with Faith?"

"What?" Walter croaked, "No -I... Faith is not permitted to dance."

"But if she was, Walter," Di continued, her voice all quiet patience, as though she was having to explain the past imperfect tense to one of her students. "If there was no Jem. Would you, did you, _do_ you want to dance with Faith?"

"But Jem _is_ here. And God willing he always will be. Faith and Jem _belong_ together."

"The way Diana and Orion _belong_ together?" Di flushed and pressed her head against the cool glass at the window. Outside the rising sun pricked through the leaves of the pear tree like a chain of constellations. "All those odes you composed to their eternal love. Did you really mean it -or were you just mocking?"

"Of course I meant them," Walter said, tenderly. Di peered at him. He had the oddest sensation of being observed and shifted uncomfortably trying to recall the opening phrase of 'Farewell Bright Hunter' -now how did it begin?

"And all your poems to Rosamond. You meant them too, I suppose."

"Ye-es..." The briefest scowl crossed Walter's face, though whether from Di's interrogating manner or his inability to conjure one line of her favourite poem, he wasn't sure. "That is, as far as one can find meaning in invention," he sounded like a dusty old professor, and smiled to himself when Di crossed her arms and huffed. "But Faith isn't Rosamond -not really," he said, as if he'd only now realised this. "Rosamond was a fantasy, a memory, a dream-"

"A pretence."

Walter felt his breath sucked out of him, Di's arrow had hit its mark, though he was not so used to her taking aim at him. "Whatever do you mean?"

"I saw you, Walter. At the tree tower. I saw you and I thought, No it couldn't be true. After all, I had been drinking and it was dark and I despised myself for thinking ill of you, for being so mistrustful when our brothers and sisters are being so brave. Then I went looking for you last night, I opened the door of the little room and I saw you _again_, saw the way you were looking-"

"I was _sleeping!_" Walter snapped, he leaped off the window seat, glaring at her.

Di wouldn't have it and met his gaze undaunted. "I _know_ you, Walter Blythe, you never looked at Faith that way." Whenever he looked at Faith he had been wistful and shy, and Di had wanted to hug him, protectively. Last night she had seen something altogether different, so fierce and powerful that she blushed to remember it. "But I've known that look and I _know_ what it means. You see, _I _wasn't pretending when I told you how I felt about- what happened at Over-Harbour. And you made me believe you felt the same way about Faith."

"I wasn't pretending, you don't understand-"

"No. I don't," Di cut in, "I told you _everything_, Walter. No one knows what I truly feel -what I felt, I mean -except for _you_."

"You're afraid, aren't you?" That's what this was really about, Di hadn't seen anything -there was nothing to see- she was only hurt that he'd let her down. Holding the hands of everyone else whilst holding in her own uncertainty. "You're thinking he might decide to enlist, too.

"He isn't eighteen yet," Di murmured, a deep red spotting her cheeks as it always did when she thought of how young he was, "I doubt his mother would sign an exemption. But his father would, I wouldn't put it past _him_ to suggest the idea, himself. God forgive me but sometimes I would give anything to see that man's face the day he finds himself on the wrong side of St Peter's gate."

Walter tucked a stray wave behind her ear, remembering when he not had the strength to do more. The day Di fell against his pillow and revealed with sickened whispers what happened behind closed doors at the O'Ryan homestead. There had been nothing she could do. Nothing Walter could do but stroke her hair over and over till her breath came as soft as his hand. "We should have told Father, My-Di, I always wanted you to-"

"And when everybody asks how I came to see the bruises on his body?" she countered with swift fury; that Walter had evaded all her attempts to be open and yet expected it of her!

"I know it seems hard, but the truth-"

"What? The truth shall set ye free?" Di said, scornfully. "Will it set _you_ free, Walter Blythe? Will you tell the truth to me?"

"There's nothing to tell," Walter replied, in a tone which meant the discussion so much as it involved him, was over. He nestled back into the window seat and began teasing out the tassels of a cushion. Di wanted to yank it from his pale poetic fingertips and fling it at his head. Instead she wrenched the curtains over the window -and over him- and stomped to the door.

"Well, so long then."

Walter popped his head through the curtain. His black hair mussed up comically, but Di had no smile for him this time. "Are we quarrelling, Di-chotomy?"

"I'm _going,_" she declared, with a flip of her long red braid.

"Where?" Walter asked her, unable to hide his bemusement.

"Fishing!" and she slammed the door behind her.

**… … …**

Carl Meredith was scanning the dips and eddies of the pond when his eye caught sight of a vivid red coming through the trees. He shot up and patted down his sandy hair because his first thought -it embarrassed him with its quickness- was that it was Rilla Blythe. Why she should be the first thing that came to mind he couldn't quite conclude. She was the sort, as was her mother, to frighten all the trout away. And he was fairly sure her brother, casting his rod with an efficient flick at the other side of Mason's pond, would agree. Though he mightn't admit it -they were a clannish lot, those Blythes.

At any rate, his concentration was all over the shop now. He decided to make another attempt at untangling the line of his second rod which had snagged against the brush behind him, teasing out the knots while expecting at every moment to hear Rilla's lilting voice filling up the silence. After that aural assault he and Shirley might as well move further up the pond -and risk the wrath of Ig O'Ryan. A man so mean he would have wrapped his whole farm in that new fangled barbed wire if it meant he could put a stop to the no-good antics of boys like Carl and Shirley.

Carl grunted, his impatience and contempt as tangled as the fishing-line. _Antics_. Fishing took care and precision, one didn't catch a fish by simply dropping in a line and hoping. And Whopper trout had more than usual _salvelinus_ smarts -he must have if he'd lived this long. So ancient, it was said Old Sandy's father hunted it when _he_ was a laddie! That being so, Whopper trout belonged fair and square to the whole of the Glen whatever part the pond he happened to lurk in. And everyone, even no good Ig O'Ryan, would just have to lump it.

More often than not it was those unlucky enough to find themselves within reaching distance of Mr Ignatius O'Ryan -and his sinewy arms could stretch unnervingly far- who bore the lumps, bumps and bruises. Even Carl's father, who was a Minister and therefore had to find _something_ Christian to say about him, called him a fellow of the lowest order -this when the man snatched Carl's butterfly net and whipped the backs of his legs with it. That night Carl had spent a good long while deciding whether it was gastropods or nematodes that Ig O'Ryan languished in.

He had just managed to loosen the line from the branch when he sensed something approach him with the measured stillness of a deer. Carl knew no such beast lurked about these parts, and that only one red-head could manage such stealth, so offered his greeting thus-

"Morning, Di Blythe,"

"Oh, Carl, when I had done everything to keep as quiet as I could."

"That's how I knew it was you," he grinned, looking up at her. There was nothing quiet about her hair, though Carl knew enough not to add that. He did not know much else about girls, but neither was he impatient to add to his knowledge. Like any good entomologist he trusted that sooner or later the beauty he sought would flutter to his finger -why waste good thinking time laying honey traps.

Di gave him a grateful smile and unrolled the small canvas square she had brought with her, and placed it on the dewy grass. So, she was to be here for a while, Carl deduced. Di sometimes came by and sat with Carl as he maintained his vigil by some burrow or nesting ground. He didn't mind so much, an extra pair of eyes often came in handy, especially sharpish green ones like hers. Maybe there was something to that, for his onetime fishing companion, the unfortunate son of Ig O'Ryan, had green eyes too. He had once gone to Di's school and must have been a favourite of hers because some days she wasn't half so interested in making an Albright knot as she was discovering what her old pupil was up to.

Di was in many ways the perfect girl. Only a little old for him, and her hair could stand with being a little more chestnut, her nose more freckled, her eyes the golden brown of _lycaena phlaeas,_ coppery and shadowy by turns... He coughed and Shirley shot him a dark look from over the pond.

"Don't suppose you brought anything else in your satchel?" Carl said, dropping the line and winking one bright blue eye. "We ate our stash on the way down here."

"You astonish me," said Di. "That's the only reason you put up with a _girl_ hanging round, isn't it? We always bring in fresh supplies."

"No-" Carl began, at about the same time that Shirley -who had scooted over on sight of the Edward VII coronation tin- said "Yesh," a slice of cold apple pie in his mouth.

When their tongues had licked the crumbs from their fingers and the sun the dewdrops from the grass, the boys began packing away their fishing gear with the unspoken understanding that it was time to move on.

"You want to risk it?" Carl said, pulsing jumpily on his haunches, thinking of how they could get to the O'Ryan side of the pond without ol' Ig spotting them.

"I'll say. Been itching to go there since yesterday."

"Itching? Shirley Blythe, since when have you been itching to get one of O'Ryan's big brown boots flung at your big brown head?"

"O'Ryan's enlisted, hasn't he. I took Jem and Jerry to the station and I saw him-"

"Sorry, what did you say, Shir?" Di had been down at the pond working a blackberry stain out from her skirt when she heard O'Ryan's name, and came scuttling up to know the worst. "You saw the O'Ryan boy at the station?"

"Not _Gilbert_ O'Ryan. His father. He left the farm to join up."

"He's ancient. Must be nearly forty -will they take him, you think?" Carl asked, hopefully.

"I believe I'll stay here, anyhow," Di muttered. There had been a moment, oh and it was dazzling in its simplicity, when she imagined herself scaling the fence of the O'Ryan place and marching straight to his front door. But then what? Di couldn't answer that -didn't even know if she could make her feet move.

Carl and Shirley had no such problems and leaped in the air with boyish glee.

"Ding-dong, what a day! About time this war gave us something to celebrate -I mean it's the law of averages, isn't it?"

"More Newton, wouldn't you say. Every action has a reaction?"

"Which one is it, teacher?" Carl laughed, without the least interest in knowing the answer. She was a brick, that Di Blythe, so quiet now ol' Whopper would probably leap into her lap. "Thanks for the eats! We'll pass on your best to your old pupil if we see him. Good ol' O'Ryan, be good to catch up with him. Now his father's gone he might have time to go fishing again."

"Might have caught Whopper, himself," Shirley said, a wicked glint in his brown eyes.

Carl answered it with a swift kick to his rump, before scampering away through the brush before he received a Blythe sized boot to the same.

"Bye Di," Shirley called, "tell the Mothers I won't be home for dinner!"

If I can get my legs to carry me there, Di thought, weighed down with utter relief. Relief was supposed to make one lighter, yet what other feeling could it be? He hadn't enlisted, his father had, and that would mean that he could stay in the Glen as long as he wished. Farmers were exempt from enlisting -someone had to keep the troops fed. He was staying and he was safe. Safe from the mortars in Belgium and the fists of ol' Ig. He was safe. He was safe. He was safe, she rejoiced. Knowing all the while that her heavy heart was still very much in danger.

**… … …**

_Thanks for the reviews, the favouriting and the following -you make me want to be a better storyteller._


	12. La Belle Epoque

**La Belle Epoque  
><strong>

_In which Di Blythe falls in love (and the author recommends a good cup of tea, a comfy chair and a hanky)  
><em>

_**Late August 1913, Ingleside ~a summery Saturday afternoon.**_

The heart makes one do foolish things. It can weigh you to the earth like an anchor, it can make you an expert in Albright knots -and the surgeon's knot and the Homer Rhode knot- and it can lead you to give up the school you wanted because someone else needed it more.

"Oh, I remember when your father did that for me," Anne sighed, eyeing her husband with a girlish glee. Gilbert passed her a teacup and kissed the top of her beloved red head.

"Your mother always was partial to the grand gesture," he winked, settling by her on the swing seat that hung from the veranda.

"This isn't a _grand_ gesture," their daughter muttered, only one more ink smudge away from sounding out and out cross, as she muddled through her lesson plan at the little wicker table. A tea cup, the sugar bowl and a silver spoon doing their best to keep the late summer breeze from blowing her paperwork into famous Ingleside geraniums

"Is it truly not, Di?" Anne began, and then pressed her lips to stifle a smirk as both husband and daughter looked at her now with the same expression -leave it be!

"None of your match-making, _Mrs _Doctor dear," Gilbert added, "Di's doing this out of the goodness of her heart, aren't you, my girl?" and gave her a wink.

Di huffed and put her pen down with an exaggerated tap. "There are no hearts, no gestures, and definitely _no_ matches involved in my decision. Jack would have to move to the Glen if he wanted to stay and teach on the Island -and I know they count on his help at The Pines. It made sense that I give up Avonlea school for him and teach here myself. There is no hidden agenda, I am simply helping someone out."

"Well, indeed so was I," said Gilbert, chuckling.

"Yes, but Father, you were also _madly_ in love."

"No, I wasn't-"

"Oh yes you were!" Anne laughed, "But you know Di, you needn't be madly in love. I only wondered if you were perhaps just the very merest-"

"No! Nor am I in love with Johnny Andrews, nor Percy Sloane, nor Victor Pye-" Heaven forbid, Anne thought, hiding a grimace behind her cup. "Nor Hector McAllister, nor Robert Sturbridge, nor Jerry Meredith, nor Kenneth Ford. And I am definitely _not_ in love with Jack Wright."

"Of course darling, I was just-"

"You were just imagining it would be sweet to have one of our children marry one of Diana's," Gilbert said, settling a teacup onto Di's pile of papers and laying his head in Anne's lap.

"I always thought it was a pity that Carl Meredith wasn't born a twin," Susan Baker piped up from behind the immense cranesbill she was re-potting. She wiped her brow and looked up to see grey, hazel and green eyes all staring at her curiously. "Well, it's a forgone certainty is it not? We can admit that here among our own, when we are not in hearing of certain confirmed spinsters who up and marry as though there were men aplenty to go around," here she glared in the direction of Four Winds.

"Susan, Miss Cornelia married Marshall Elliot over twenty years ago."

"Well, and who said I was referring to_ Mrs_ Elliot, Mrs Doctor dear? Though if _you_ think we cannot speak freely of our children's affairs of the heart around _that_ woman then I suppose I can only agree with you. _I_ was merely saying that Jem and Faith look sure to unite the Blythes and the Merediths, and if I'm not mistaken Jerry and Nan mean to go the same way. So to _my_ way of thinking it is a sure shame that Jerry and Carl weren't twins like our girls."

"And may one ask why?" Gilbert asked, Anne tweaking his nose with playful warning.

"Well for _Di_, of course!"

The pen was put down with such force now that the teacups rattled. "I am _not_ in love with Carl Meredith!"

"Well of course you're not, Di dear," Susan said, and then looked up to see three sets of eyes peering at her again. "Well, he's a whole year younger than her, isn't he? That wouldn't do," she tutted to the flower heads, "that wouldn't do at all."

**… … …**

And neither would the Over-Harbour school. There were good reasons why not one teacher stayed there for more than a year. It was a ragged timbered building, filled with ragged haired children, who had ragged tempered parents. This was the fourth one to burst through the door this afternoon, demanding her child be called by her full and proper name and none of these natty little nicknames Miss Blythe had _innersplikably_ made up!

"To think I named my girl for yer good father!"

Yes and you weren't the only one_,_ Di thought, as she stretched her mouth into something resembling a smile.

There were a total of five Gilberts, two Gilbertinas and two Gilbertines on her roll -what on earth was she supposed to call them all? The boys could be called by their surnames but the Thomas MacAllisters and the Harvey MacAllisters had both named their sons Gilbert, and both boys had to be pulled apart at recess when they couldn't agree over who was to be called Gil and who Bert. Of the girls, Di was sure that one would answer gladly to Tina -but Gilbertina Farley's mother had other ideas.

_"_Yer d'sparingin' the Doctor by callin' my girl, Tina," Mrs Farley bellowed, elbowing her daughter to agree. "Why, we _always_ call you Gilbertina, don't we Gilly?"

"I blame you, Father," Di complained at supper that night. "Couldn't you have had cold hands or dropped one or two occasionally? Half the Glen are named for you, you know."

The comforts of her own room and Susan's baking would not make up for even half the trouble she was going to have this year. Why had she been so set on taking the Over-Harbour school? Clearly the easy comforts of a dear sweet Avonlea, her dear sweet school house, and those dear sweet children had rotted her brain the way sugar rotted teeth. Lucky Jack Wright would probably have finished all his marking by now, and be looking forward to an evening to enjoy as he wished. As it was Di hadn't even settled on the names of her students yet.

The next day proved no better, and when Di settled down to begin her marking that afternoon she didn't even look up when the door was flung open and a tall figure strode straight up to her.

"I've come to enrol, Miss. Gilbert O'Ryan."

Di pursed her lips together to hide a grimace, and looked up. He was a very tanned, broad shouldered man -somewhat young to be father to a school age child, though this was not so unusual at Over-Harbour. But where she might have expected a missing tooth or a leathery complexion she saw bright green eyes -not a wild, sea green like her own, but leafy, laughy green- and a full lipped smile that Walter would have described as puckish. Di did not have to try and hide a grimace now, but rather a gaping grin. Perhaps he was the older brother of Gilbert the sixth. She stood up and held out her hand and he stuck a bright red apple in it.

"Oh, thank you, ah, Mr O'Ryan, was it?" Di stammered, and the next thing she knew she put the apple to her mouth and took a_ bite. _

"There's more if you want 'em. Got a whole bushel on my bike," he laughed, as Di tried to speak through a mouthful.

"I missed lunch," she said, finally. What she felt was that she was missing her brain. "Though generally," Di continued, when she managed to remember where her chair was and opened her enrolment book, "it's the students that give apples to their teachers. Where is the boy?"

"He's here," he replied, "I'm Gilbert O'Ryan," and he bent in close pretending to look about for the likes of Mrs Mangle, and teasingly told her that he didn't mind at all if she called him by his last name. "It's like the constellation, isn't it, Miss Blythe. Orion the hunter."

At this Di could not help but go all 'apple' -as she would come to call it- red faced and unable to speak. She decided to let O'Ryan do the talking and listened of his ambition to pass the Summerside entrance exam and be the first in his family to graduate high school.

"I might have done it a while back. I was all set to take it when I was fourteen but we had crops fail two years in a row and couldn't afford the extra hands so..." he went quiet, waiting for Di to come to her own conclusions. It was not uncommon for sons of the land -and daughters too- to have to fit their education around the realities of farm life. "But they don't want me tied down to the fickleness of weather and seasons and the price of potatoes, Mother especially. It hurt her when I had to leave school..." His eyes went to the rickety stove in the corner and then to a window beyond it, he rubbed his brown hands over his thighs almost nervously and looked at her again. "But I reckon with your help, Miss Blythe..." his green eyes lingering on hers.

"Certainly, O'Ryan," Di said, standing up abruptly. When he stood too she saw they were the exact same height. "And I promise you by this time next year ...let's see, September 1914, you'll sitting at your first class at Summerside."

"I meant it too," Di told her family at the table that night -a wiser, more determined young woman than the one who had sat there only one evening before. "If the one thing I accomplish this year is helping the O'Ryan boy to pass his entrance I shall think it one of my grandest achievements," she declared in what she imagined were rather noble tones.

"Careful now, all those Over-Harbour folk will be naming their children after you next," Gilbert twinkled.

"Diana O'Ryan. How sweet that sounds," Anne said, dreamily, "like the child of Artemis and the Hunter."

Unfortunately Di was spooning mulligatawny into her mouth as her mother spoke when she went all _apple _again_. _Gilbert observed his daughter and wondered if she wasn't so much choking as blushing. He tossed a napkin at her pink face and thought perhaps this other Gilbert chap would have to watch his head, too.

**… … …**

Di was having a good idea just how her mother must have felt. Gilbert O'Ryan was nothing short of infuriating! On his second day she'd had to rope in three boys to pull him off Joe and Micah Thompson.

"They were sassin' my Father!" he roared.

Di did not need to guess what the scamps had been calling Mr O'Ryan. There were only so many words that rhymed with Ig.

"He is too," Micah cried, rubbing his nose, "he's 'bunctious and ugly like an old boar!"

Di would have said he looked more like a praying mantis, herself. The last time she saw him he was lurking at the school gate waiting to pounce on his son, "I told you we were pullin' stumps from the back field this afternoon," he said, quietly, and gave Di a conspiratorial wink as though she shared his views on Gilbert's disobedience.

Well, and so she did. He came in late, he fell asleep in class, his handwriting was atrocious.

"Frank's hand is better than yours and he's on the third reader," Di admonished him after class.

It had been a wretched day and bitterly cold. In desperation Di had loaded the rusty old stove with wet wood which had steamed and hissed to such degrees the chimney pipe had burst and foul smoke had choked through the building. Di had no choice but to let her class out early. But her gratitude to O'Ryan, who had stayed on to help mend the stove, only went so far before she felt bound to mention her disappointment with his progress.

"Fine ideas count for nothing, my boy, if I cannot read them."

"It's those cursed nibs on my pens, Miss Blythe -they're all split."

"I reminded you to replace them last week, and don't say cursed, O'Ryan."

"I will, I will, I just have to get round to askin'... He's busy, you know."

Di nodded, she had not seen much of ol' Ig since the fields were tilled for crop rotation at the end of Autumn, and many a boy had been pulled away at that time, not only O'Ryan. She sat on a bench and dried her hands on her apron, admiring the stove with satisfaction, and motioned her wayward student to sit by her.

As he perched on the bench Di noticed a dusty smudge on his cheekbone, highlighting his brown skin and the sprinkle of stubble growing patchily on his jaw. O'Ryan began to rub his wrist, his hair grew overly long over his eyes and he attempted to tuck it back, drawing a finger across his brow and a long white line of ash. The boy looked careworn and overgrown, in short he needed taking in hand. She looked at his hands as he worked on them and wondered.

"Those tatty cuffs don't help," Di said, her voice softening. She peered at the blackened fingerless gloves and went to peel one off.

"Leave 'em," he said, hotly.

"I was going to feed those mucky things to the fire. We've plenty of gloves at Ingleside, I could bring you a new pair for every day of the week, then perhaps you might manage to write a comprehensible sentence," Di smiled, trying to coax one in him.

"What does it matter, I'm never going to Summerside."

No you're not, Di thought, ruefully. But on seeing the defeated look on his face she couldn't bring herself to agree with him.

"Hmm, let's see," she said, playfully, and reached for him again. "Polly-Jean's grandmother tells me you can divine a whole life's story from your palm. What do you think we might find written on yours?"

She withdrew the matted wool cuff he wore and examined him. His skin was swollen, cracked and red. The hands of a boy who'd been up every day on freezing 4 am mornings to milk two dozen cows by himself and then back to do the same after school. Di wanted to weep, wondering how he had been able to hold a pen at all. Instead she traced a finger across the calloused, angry skin as if she hadn't noticed anything amiss, and hemmed and hawed while her finger drew soft circles over his palm.

"Oh, yes, definitely going to be a highschool boy, I can see that quite clear."

"You always call me boy," he said, hoarsely.

"And so you are." Only just managing not to add- and _quite_ a one at that. The feel of his hand in hers was making her go all 'apple' again.

"I can do the work of any man, I'm as strong as any man, I'll be seventeen next week-"

And I am eighteen_. _"Would you like some new gloves as a birthday present?"

"There's is one thing I would like..." His eyes were not laughy now, they had not been for some time. They looked of the sea and Di knew hers looked the same. She withdrew her hands and rubbed them on her apron, looking behind his brown tousled head and wishing that anyone, even a ragged-tempered parent, would burst through the door right now. "I would like for you... not to call me boy anymore."

Di was overwhelmed by a mix of relief and fondness that made her glad she was sitting down. "You know there's more to being a man than physical strength. It takes strength of character, too. A willingness to be open, to trust-"

Di was thinking of Walter. He had come home from Redmond last week to recuperate from lingering head pain, and was taken to Charlottetown two days ago when he became feverish.

"I know you want to hide it from Mother, Walter," Di said, tenderly, "but tell me the truth. You're very sick, aren't you?"

"I could never hide anything from you and I'd never try," her brother said, with a weak smile. "Looks to be some sort of typhus, I'd say. It hurts, Di, it hurts like the Devil himself was trying to break me."

There was strange comfort in knowing the worst. Somehow Di believed it couldn't happen then, not if one said it out loud. Something of Nan's superstitious, imaginative nature had surely rubbed off on her. And as she watched her parents help Walter out the door she missed her twin powerfully; wishing Nan wasn't teaching at White Sands, that Jem wasn't at Redmond, or Shirley at Queens. That night she hugged tight at her baby sister -who was not a baby anymore- and whispered her little lies about Walter's bad headache and bigger ones that he would never, ever die.

"We must always face things squarely, O'Ryan," though Di might have meant those same words for herself. "To be honest is to be brave."

"You're speaking of my cuffs, I suppose," O'Ryan said. "Father's tryin' his hand at a dairy."

Trying his son's hands_,_ Di thought, contemptuously. "Why would he do that when he knew you were returning to school?"

"He has a right to a better life just as I have. He remortgaged the farm to buy thirty milkers."

"And who does he expect will take care of them when you're at Summerside?"

"Well, it's like I said, I won't be going, will I? There's no way I can pass the entrance when I can't even write so well as Frankie West."

"We can fix that right now," Di exclaimed, and went to the little stove and fetched the kettle that nestled on its freshly blackened top. The mugs of milky tea she made were often the first hot thing her smudgy, patched up children had tasted all morning. Some of them huddling in the porch waiting for her arrival just so they might finally warm up. It would have broken Di's heart if she had thought a broken heart would help. But there was no place for sentiment at Over-Harbour, not when there were grubby faces to wipe, and leaky boots to stop up, and the poor cracked skin of Gilbert O'Ryan to attend to.

"Here, bathe your hands in this," Di commanded and dunked his hand into a basin of steamy water.

"Ow, it stings!"

"It's only epsom salts -I wish to goodness I had more iodine." Like many other additions to her store cupboard it frequently went missing. "But this will do to be getting on with. Now while you soak the other I'll put some lanolin-"

"That's for girls!"

"And for boys who mean to be_ men._ Now give me your hand and no more nonsense," Di smirked, and worked the oily paste into his skin.

So it began. No one, not even the doughtiest of matchmakers would have thought that something very much like love might have sprung from something so banal as a crock of lanolin. Not even Susan Baker, had she had eyes to see it. But she did not. There was no good reason for her to linger round the likes of Over-Harbour when there was Ingleside to keep warm through that icy winter of '13 _and_ a Christmas to prepare for. One that might cheer the stretched thin faces of the Doctor and Mrs as they huddled over their flickering hope that Walter might come home from the hospital for the holidays. Rilla was absorbed in the organisation of the annual Christmas concert; Nan and the boys still to see out the school term. And so, by degrees, inch by inch, Di learned how to become invisible.

This was done, as she was later to learn from Carl Meredith, by hiding in plain sight. For how else is a person with the brightest, reddest hair supposed to conceal herself. She sent jolly letters to her family and friends, discussed the teaching of the dreaded Euclid with Mother, the correct way to stop a bloody nose with Father, and the proper maintenance of a temperamental stove with Susan. Only Walter might have noticed, might have put his finger on something else that was burning. Keeping the school house piping hot as the stove crackled its last, and Di bolted the door and made her way home each night -on the arm of O'Ryan.

Each day he would head to school at whatever time he could be spared from the farm, leave for the afternoon's milking at four, and return for what he and Di called 'the Entrance class'. This usually began with a hot basin of water and a jar of lanolin grease and ended with a walk under the stars. Sometimes it had been eight o'clock before Di returned to Ingleside.

"She's a perfect slave to that school!"

"Her dedication puts me in mind of Miss Stacey!"

"Be warned, teacher dear, a host of baby Dianas are just waiting to be named for you!"

"You said you would show _me_ how to weave one of those twisty little knots in my hair!"

Rilla pouted, eyeing her sister enviously. Di looked so well with her hair like that it almost made her wish her hair were less chestnut and more coppery after all. "I don't see why you should fuss with your hair so much when it's only those Over-Harbour brats you're spending _all_ your time with."

"Rilla! That's very uncharitable-"

"Carl says that she must be trying to make Gilbert O'Ryan into a first class professor. He never goes ice fishing anymore, and you're never at _home_ anymore. When are you going to show me how to twist my hair. The Christmas concert is in _three days!_"

There was no concert at Over-Harbour, instead Di lead her class around the village and sang carols door to door. It was lovely to see those scrubbed pink cheeks and mouths singing merrily through the snowy night, feel those little hands in too big mittens and holey gloves pressed tightly into her own creamy cashmere ones. Only once did Di wish on the stars above that her own star pupil might have been there among them.

Di had long returned her last child to their home and was marching through the glowing snows on Glen Street when she heard the crunch of footsteps come swiftly behind her. She knew it was O'Ryan without even needing to turn -which was fortunate because snowshoes make for very awkward turns. She knew it was him because she knew how he carried his body through the snow. She knew it was him because... her heart told her he would come. He was standing in front of her, and there was lovely warm streaks of cloud coming from his mouth, and lovely warm lights in his eyes, and lovely warm hands that reached for hers in perfect leaf-green cable stitch.

"You were never going to slow down, were you?" he grinned.

"I knew you'd catch up. You found my parcel, I see."

He pulled one hand away and wriggled his fingertips that peeped through the tops of the knitted cuffs. "They are bully. You don't mean to tell me you made these for all thirty-two of us?"

"Oh, I- no. I admit my other charges all got scarves. We've been stitching up a storm at Ingleside."

"Good, I was worried that your hands would be in a worse state than mine. Not that they are anymore -they're perfect now. I mean not perfect, of course, just regular workin' hands- I -I'm sorry I'm rambling. You see the thing is I have something, too -something for you, Miss Blythe." He pulled out a small package from his coat pocket and pressed it into her hands. "Don't worry it's not another bar of pink soap."

"I have enough of those now to keep every one of you ship shape and Bristol fashion all the way into next summer," Di laughed, eyeing the tiny brown paper square. "Shall I put it under the tree at home?"

"Of course, if you like. I love the thought of you... of you opening it on Christmas morning. I only wondered if perhaps... well, like I said, it's not a cake of soap."

"I shall have to open it now!" Di said, she peeled off one of her gloves and began to unwrap the little packet.

"It's not much, I -I made it myself."

Inside the scrap of paper was a fine silver coloured pin in the shape of an arrow, with tiny fletching in greens and coppers.

"You mean to say you made this -_you_ made this?"

"From a fishing hook, there's part of a lure there too," he said, pointing to the feathers.

"It's exquisite."

He beamed proudly, and Di began to remove her second glove in order to pin it onto her coat. O'Ryan took the arrow from her hand and unfastened the clasp.

"It's a fairly simple mechanism, you just -there see, and then... Ah, may I?" He bent toward her. She felt his fingers against her coat lapel and his breath against her cheek. "There. Merry Christmas, Miss Blythe."

He replaced her gloves very gently, so that she had a sensation of what he must have felt when she touched his hands.

"Thank you, Gilbert O'Ryan."

"I'm not named for your father, you know," he said, tucking a brown wave under his cap. "I came to the Island by steamer. I don't remember much, just someone liftin' me up to peep out the porthole and I couldn't tell where the sea stopped and the stars began. All I had were the clothes I stood up in and a luggage tag with my name on it."

"You were a-"

"A Home child, yes. Though it seems strange to call England home when I have no memory of that place. I got sent to live with the O'Ryans, and right away they adopted me and named me as one of their own. I felt so good and important, I remember, havin' a real last name. Because there was none on that luggage tag -only the name Gilbert, pinned just there," and he pressed his finger tenderly against her pin.

It was as if that arrow went right through Di's heart.

"Though not half so neatly fashioned," he continued, with a shy grin, his fingers lingering on the blue lapel of her coat. He looked at her and again Di found it hard to meet his gaze because she knew she should see her own eyes gazing back. "When I hear you say O'Ryan, Miss Blythe, I think I really could be somebody. That I really belong up there." He pointed one green cuff at the sky, "And that's the best thing anyone's ever given me."

Then he walked away, the crunching of the snow drowned out by her chattering teeth.

**_… … …_**

1914 was about to be the best year Di Blythe had ever known. The squally winter melted into the balmiest spring -Mayflowers were out in March! Walter had recovered from the worst of the fever and was now back at home. The Board of Education was ordering the construction of a brand new school house for the children of Over-Harbour, _and_ had announced two scholarships to the boy and girl who obtained the highest marks in the entrance exam. This was not only wonderful news for O'Ryan but for his teacher. Di had been preparing to have stern words with his parents about providing for his schooling costs, and in this her mother had proved far more helpful than she had with Euclid.

"You must always make these things look as though it was their idea all along," Anne said, as she lay on the twins' bed and watched Di at the dressing table. "But in the end you must simply be brave and say the thing you are most afraid to say. More often than not they are just as afraid as you are."

She had meant to sound worldly wise but her words could not contain her lightheartedness. Walter would live, Di was in bloom, and made everything she touched bloom with her. Anne nestled happily against a pillow and observed her daughter as she unrolled her hair for the second time and pinned it in another style. Di had the look of a girl who hugged a secret to her breast, wearing it with as much ecstasy as another girl would wear a rope of diamonds. Which was just as well, Anne smiled to herself, feeling that somehow Di Blythe would never know -nor care- for such riches, anymore than Anne did.

"Come and give your old mother a kiss from that glowing face of yours," Anne called, as Di dashed to the door, "I could use some extra at my age."

"Ho Ho, Mother," Di said laughingly, never foreseeing that the radiant madonna the world had so miraculously blessed them all with, would ever, _ever_ fade -for what could hurt them now? "Now, here's one kiss for you, another for Dads, and one for Walt -I have no time to have our chat today. The train to Summerside leaves in less than half an hour and I promised my prized student I would see him off." And she skipped from Ingleside as though the pin at her lapel was all that kept her heart from bursting open.

**… … …**

The following morning Di sat at her desk and looked up at the clock. The exam would have started now, and she let her head fall into her arms and sobbed brokenly. All the wretched pain of the day before was finally let go. Pain that left her so breathless she felt like a ghost. Nodding, eating, praying, reading like some hollowed out version of herself. It seemed indecent to think it but she felt the way Walter looked -and it was nothing but utter selfishness to use his headache as an excuse to avoid him. There had just been the long hours of the night to get through and then she could escape, setting off at first light back to her schoolhouse.

"On a Saturday now!" Susan grumbled, as she knocked the air out of the proved bowls of dough, "Thank goodness Di is to go to Redmond in the Fall. What they expect of a girl, these days -it makes you weep."

Di was afraid to stop crying. Afraid of the emptiness she knew would be left in its wake -she who once felt as if she would burst. There was O'Ryan's desk, there the store cupboard with the basin and the iodine, there the old stove, her blackboard, the little cot set in the alcove behind it that itinerant teachers had once used as living quarters. It would all be gone soon. When the term ended and Di handed in her resignation it would be demolished and a bright new building would take its place. She wiped her wet, raw eyes and saw an hour had passed -they would be commencing the geography section now- and she wished her school house might be pulled down this very minute, with her inside it.

By the time Di had walked to the station, yesterday, she had it all mapped out in her practical head. O'Ryan was _bound_ to get the scholarship and then who was to say he wouldn't win another? Mother had won the Avery and that had paid for her first year's tuition. In as little as a year and a half he might be at Redmond with her, and then...

But O'Ryan was not at the station. And when Di realised he was now in danger of not making it in time to register for the exam she marched over to the farmstead and rapped frantically on the door.

It opened instantly, Ignatius O'Ryan greeting her as though expecting her arrival at any moment. Everything in the house was well used yet impeccably polished and clean. Mrs Rachel and Marilla might have complimented the housekeeping and thrift, if not for the stagnant, thick atmosphere, as though windows, doors and curtains were never allowed open. Di wanted to remove her jacket almost immediately but could not contain the fearful, creeping sensation she had whenever Mr O'Ryan looked at her. He seemed to study her quite coolly, without any embarrassment at all. Di summoned all her determination to speak calmly and firmly -she was merely inquiring after one of her students- but every time she opened her mouth Mr O'Ryan would anticipate what she wanted to say and speak over her.

"Good-"

"Good day to you, Miss Blythe."

"I've come to discover where-"

"The whereabouts of Gilbert, no doubt."

"Y-yes," Di said, trying to keep her voice even, "the train-"

"The train to Summerside. Gilbert has no chance of getting there now, has he? No chance. Jessie, summon Gilbert will you? Tea, Miss Blythe?"

"N-no-"

"No of course, I don't imagine you'll be staying long." He sat in his armchair, it was a low slung piece of furniture and that made his knees come up to his ears.

Di turned expectantly as Gilbert O'Ryan came down the stairs, his scruffy brown hair obscuring his eyes.

"Miss Blythe."

"O -Gilbert," Di said, all frustration and fury dissolving.

"Miss Blythe, I no longer want to take the entrance exam. A high school education is -is an irrelevant expense," Di knew very well that he was reciting something he had been told to say. "But I do want to thank you for your concern," with those last words he looked up at her briefly, then resumed his gaze at the floor.

"Well..." Di said, weakly, waiting for Ig O'Ryan to talk over her. "Well," she said again, as her anger grew. Ig sat back in his chair as though whatever this copper-topped Miss might have to say now would merely provide him with a cheap piece of entertainment -Di thought he almost smiled. "Well, this... this is not to be believed. O'Ryan -Gilbert," her voice ragged with incomprehension, "I simply cannot accept what I'm hearing. You wanted this. I _know_ you did-"

"He did, oh he did, Miss Blythe, and we are so proud of him," Jessie O'Ryan said from behind her boy's shoulder. "But we can't spare the money and we can't spare our boy."

"It's for the best," O'Ryan said.

Di fled the house before any of them had the satisfaction of seeing her cry.

There were no tears left now. She felt calmer yet horribly numb, as though something inside her had gone. She supposed she might have felt like this anyway, after all this exam had been all she had thought about. But this was a lie. It had nothing to do with the exam and everything to do with the boy who was supposed to be taking it. Ninety minutes had passed now, that would be Latin translation -stulta, stultus esset, stulti...

Di had imagined she would distract herself with the marking, the lesson plans, the school reports, until the sun passed over the leaky roof and flooded the west windows. That was what one did, wasn't it? Threw oneself into work. Father could do it, when Mother was sweethearting with another lad Father had gone on to win the Cooper Prize. But such presence of mind eluded her, Di only wanted to go home. She walked numbly across the classroom and met O'Ryan leaning on the porch post by the front door.

Di's first impulse was to stalk past him, her second to kick him -hard, and her third to... She hadn't decided on a third before he spoke in that disarming, open way that always made her go quite apple.

"Do you forgive me, Miss Blythe?"

"You've let yourself down. Not me."

"I know you don't think so, but it is for the best-"

"Then we have different ideas about what constitutes the best, I think," Di said in a manner she hoped was colder than she felt. She wanted to hug him to her. He looked more lost than she was. His green eyes had a sheen of pain all through them and he stooped as if he lacked the strength to stand.

"I was hopin'... I ah, might get some of your iodine- that you keep in the store cupboard."

_Iodine_. He came here for iodine! He was probably the one pilfering the stuff all along. She sighed and stomped to the cupboard and brought out a bottle made of thick brown glass.

"Is it for your hands-" Di said, curtly.

"I have a few cuts on my back, nothin' serious-"

"Cuts! What on earth have you been doing between yesterday and today?"

"Like I said it's nothin'. I had a fall."

"A fall? Let me see- perhaps I should let Father know-"

"It's really no bother, I just thought I'd clean 'em up a little."

Di wondered why he hadn't asked his mother to treat his wounds, then had a sickening sense that this was how he saw her after all; as a mother figure to dote on him and cheer him on. She slugged a good amount of the liquid on some gauze and went to pull up his shirt tail.

"No!" he yelped, moving so stiffly he wasn't able to grab his shirt away and prevent her from seeing his injuries.

Di went white.

"O'Ryan go to the cot at the back of the school house and lie down."

"It's really not-"

"I said go now and lie on the cot." Di closed the school house door and bolted it shut.

"Oh, no no no..." she murmured, as she filled her basin with water. "Oh, no no no..." she whispered as she walked to the back room. O'Ryan was trying to shuffle his old blue jacket from his shoulders. Di removed it and began to unbutton his shirt.

"I have to, I'm sorry, it's stuck in parts to your back."

Her voice was small and stretched. It was as though she was watching herself. Someone else was loosening his clothing, someone else feeling how he trembled, someone else hearing him try not to cry. Di peeled his shirt off as gently as she could -_No No No _thumping through her as she saw the welts and bruises across his shoulders and back. He lay down on the little cot and Di bathed all the crusted blood away. As she patted him dry she saw pink weals and thin scars from older wounds. This was no fall. Someone had done this to him and would do it again.

"Don't go back there, O'Ryan," Di said, tearfully. She sat on the floor by the little cot, and smoothed his hair in soft comforting strokes the way she would for Walter when his head hurt.

"Of course I'm going back," he told her, "I have to. My Mother -she's all I've got."

"You've got me," Di said, trying to smile.

O'Ryan reached for her hand -she thought he was going to hold it in his. Instead he moved it away, pulling himself up and grabbing his shirt from the floor. "You're off to Redmond in the Fall, Miss Blythe. I milk cows."

Di flushed hotly as pride and shame, unbearable hurt and sweetest love all fought within her. And in his own green eyes, as always, she saw the same. "It doesn't have to be that way, O'Ryan," Di said, even as she did not know -not truly- how it could be otherwise.

The boy just shrugged and inched into his jacket. Di longed to help him but knew if she tried he would only push her away. "To be brave is to be honest. I have to face things squarely, just like you said."

He halted to the door, Di found herself pressing the key into the lock all the while knowing once she opened it that he would walk out and never come back. Remembering when he bowled through this door full of high hopes for himself. Remembering his light, excited step as he walked toward her that winter's night. The way he'd pinned the arrow to her breast -she was not wearing it today, she couldn't bear to feel it there. As if it mattered, she always felt it, whether she wore it or not.

"You said you belonged with the stars!" she burst out, not quite knowing what she meant. Only that, as it always was with him, she was reminding herself as well.

"I still belong," O'Ryan said, simply. He pressed his hand against the lapel of her jacket and that wonderfully puckish smile flashed briefly on his lips. "And I promise you, Diana, one day I'll meet you there."

Di was still standing in the doorway long after he'd gone, holding onto a porch-post until she forgot the time. The hands of the school clock pointing up to the sky. The entrance exam was over.

**… … …**

_One myth about Orion is that his lover, Diana, accidentally killed him when her jealous brother dared her to see if she could hit a rock miles out at sea. Diana shot an arrow and hit it instantly, never knowing as her brother did, that it was Orion she had shot. To make up for her grief Orion was turned into stars._

_Latin roughly translates to she was foolish, he was foolish, we were foolish_

_:o)_


	13. Two Hundred Strokes

_With a million thanks to AlinyaAlethia for the hundred strokes.  
><em>

**Two Hundred Strokes**

_In which Una Meredith makes her appearance; and Faith begins to disappear  
><em>

**The Manse, Glen St Mary; May 15th, 1908**

Faith Meredith was walking the walls, lying on her bed and creeping her feet up the willow leaf wallpaper. Her toes just about reached that little butterfly -Aunt Martha was right, she really was running to all arms and legs. It was very annoying this growing up business, her best stockings only came past her knees now. She wondered how one went about letting down hems on dresses, surely it couldn't be that difficult. A crooked seam might be better than bare legs showing, and made up her mind to ask one of those twins tomorrow.

She was thinking which one would be best to ask, that jaunty Nan or her jolly sister Di, when a loud thud interrupted her thoughts. She lifted her chin upwards, gazing back to see her younger sister, Una, setting her hands on her hips with quiet satisfaction.

"What do you think?"

"'Bout what, Una?" Faith said, tumbling over herself and leaning over the end of the iron bedstead.

"This. It's going to be our new dressing table," Una announced. She had never understood why the old Georgian bureau lived in the upstairs landing. Unable to let go of the uncomfortable feeling that wherever else this ancient, oak desk belonged it was not outside their bedroom door. "See, we can let this leaf down," Una continued, and did just that, lowering the desk top and resting it on their folding brackets that were found underneath. "And put all our treasures in these little drawers above it," she added proudly, having already secreted the spray of curling ferns that black haired boy, Walter Blythe, had given her yesterday.

"Every crumbling ruin/ Every fallen stone/ Softens into beauty/ By the ferns o'ergrown," he said, with a dreamy, almost ghosty voice, as though someone spoke the poem all through him.

Una was filled with an eery tingle, wondering -could it really be _true_- that perhaps she had found someone else who felt things go all the way inside and shiver them about. Sometimes it felt like the cruellest wind, like when she ran to Mother's chair only to remember that Mother wasn't there and never would be. Sometimes it was like being on a lurching boat, with Una always wanting to point herself to calmer waters only someone else's hand was on the rudder. And sometimes... oh it was like sea mist and birdsong and hot baked potatoes all at once!

Yesterday they sat down by the dearest little stream in the Valley to thick slices of bread and hot fried fish. Una feeling as though she dined on a cloud -she might have floated away if not for the tugging fear that Carl's pesky mice might jump onto the little log table at any moment!

She smiled again as she tucked an old piano stool under the bureau, one could almost smell the pink and purple roses that had been embroidered upon the seat. How exciting it had been to find that little stool. She had hunted high and low about the rambling old Manse looking for the piano that might go with it. Imagine that, their own piano! Una longed to play, knowing in her heart that the music would travel through her like a sunbeam or a mistrally wind. The piano was nowhere to be found. Still she was glad -it was that click into place sort of glad- when she thought of it as a seat for her dressing table. It looked almost as good as the real thing and she told her sister as much.

"Hmmm, I suppose so," Faith said, running her chin along the end of the bed head, "But why go to the trouble of making one in the first place is what I'd like to know?"

"Because," Una said, kneeling upon the stool and reaching up to place an old spotted mirror on the knob of a drawer, "that's what young ladies have in their rooms, isn't it? I could just tell that Nan and Di Blythe had a dressing table. A place for all their pretty things."

"We don't have pretty things," Faith said. She did not sound as if she minded but the way she flopped back on the bed told Una the opposite.

"Yes we do. All Mother's things, we've just never had a nice place to put them before."

"I like keeping them in the tea chest-"

"But look how well they look here," Una said, and pulled at Faith's hand with a gentle insistence.

Faith saw all their mother's belongings set out neatly on the desk top. Her lacy doilies, her silver and ivory vanity set, the empty jar of cold cream and the full one of dusting powder. There was a sweet oval mirror hanging above it all, with Faith's sweet oval face peering back at her.

"I say Una, it's as bully as anything in the Blythe house, I bet." She placed a kiss on Una's grateful face. "Now when we do the two hundred strokes you can sit here, and we can use Mother's silver brush instead of that ol' wooden thing. The boys can have that back."

"I don't think they've missed it, though," Una giggled, thinking of her tousle-haired brothers.

"Children, come down for tea!" Aunt Martha hollered up the stairwell. Never once thinking to remind the Meredith offspring to wash up first or help decorate the table.

Faith groaned as she splashed cold water on her hands. "Can you smell what I smell?"

Una shook her head with a curious no as she slipped the soap about her fingers.

"Exactly!" her sister hurumphed, thinking of the cold, greasy meal they were about to be served _again. "_Ditto. Ditto. Ditto. Ditto. If I ever see a bit of boiled mutton when I grow up..." and gambolled down the stairs before Una could hear of her diabolical plan for revenge.

That night Una sat at her new dressing table with a happy heart. She could not quite see her reflection in the looking glass, just one velvety black eyebrow and the silver brush going up and down her hair. She smiled, contentedly, imagining it was Mother whose hands touched her now -though Mother would have been a little kinder when the brush snagged on her tangles.

"Do you think that Jem Blythe would teach us how to fillet a fish?" Faith asked her, as she pulled black strands of hair from the bristles. "Those little trout were _so_ good. If a girl was to marry a boy like that she'd never need to cook again."

"I should want to find out more about a boy before I married him than whether he could cook a fish supper."

"But it was done so well. Wasn't I cross when I spotted Carl feeding a tiny bit of it to his mice! _I_ could have eaten all ours in a moment. It was nice of Jem Blythe to share it with us... Nice of all of the Blythes, I mean."

Faith stared into the mirror again. For the smallest moment she almost looked as if she admired herself -or at least wondered if she could be admired- then poked her out her tongue and dropped the brush on the desktop.

But she's only done one hundred and eighty-nine strokes, Una thought, how could she have missed that?

Faith skipped to the wash house and when she came back Una was still sitting at the dressing table waiting for eleven more strokes to be made. Mother _always_ did two hundred. And when Mother had died Faith had promised her heartbroken sister that every night for ever and ever she would brush Una's long black hair just exactly as Mother had done. Two hundred strokes. For ever and ever. And Faith had never missed a night, never missed a stroke -not even when she had that horrid sore throat, or when her pet rooster accidentally nipped her finger.

Now after one fried fish she had miscounted by eleven strokes. That cold lurching feeling went through Una. She gripped the little piano stool and sat up straight, her wide blue eyes staring back from the mirror, as doleful as ever they could be.

"Come on, Miss Luna," Faith sang, as she leaped onto the bed. "You look all moony when you stare like that. Come help me warm up, I shall never give in and wear Aunt Martha's scratchy socks. Not when I've still got _you_ to snuggle into."

Una braided her hair quickly -just one tonight- and slipped in beside her sister. Faith taking the long silken rope between her fingers and tickling the end of it over her mouth till she fell into sleep.

Never mind, Mother, Una said to herself, it was only eleven we missed. She blew eleven kisses up through the crack in the ceiling and into the heavens beyond.

**… … …**

_**The Manse, Glen St Mary; April 15th, 1912**_

Una Meredith sat at her dressing table and loosened the taffeta ribbon from around her head. As she brushed her hair by lamplight she watched her hands move rhythmically in the mirror's reflection, the gilded brush gliding through her hair like quicksilver. The little looking-glass was not large enough to catch much more -not that it mattered to Una, who knew very well what would stare back at her. The same long black hair, the same small, grave face, a neat little mouth with neater white teeth. And eyes, large and doleful -_soulful_, Walter Blythe said.

Una knew it was really her little brother who had the soulful eyes -if not the solemn expression to match it. Though others had said it and said it still, Una saw it was not quite so. It was Carl who had Mother's eyes. But when Una caught sight of her hands in the mirror laying two hundred strokes on her hair, she could see Mother's hands and sometimes -oh but not nearly enough- she could hear Mother's voice singing through the ivy leaves that grew round the bedroom window.

They murmured to her now, though Una had not the ears to hear tonight, not when the very core of her beat so loudly. There had been the most terrifying news from abroad, and Una counted the strokes aloud as she always did when she tried to rein in her galloping heart -fifty-eight, fifty-nine... Even her hands seemed to shake until she realised that it was not her reflection but the mirror itself, rocking on a gust of wind that spirited through the open window.

Another girl would have tutted, stood up, and shut the casement without another thought. Una put her brush down -it was the sixty-first stroke- and felt behind the looking glass for the shoelace she had tied to the wire, looping it onto the drawer below and securing it soundly. Because the window would have to stay open. How else would her sister get back into the house?

She resumed brushing her hair, watching her hands pass over the silvery glass, steady and sure. She couldn't have endured seeing them tilt and sway tonight. Thinking of that ship. That gigantic, unsinkable ship. What must it have been like... to be out on the frozen seas as the floor beneath you gave way and there was nowhere to go but down, down... Seventy-two, seventy-three, seventy-four...

The window gave a familiar creak and through filmy lengths came one white leather boot, and then another, landing on the floor with a neat little tap.

"Oof," Faith said, breathlessly, "It is a job trying to get up that ivy in the spring. All that new green growth, there's hardly anything to hold onto -for a moment there I thought I was a goner!"

Though Una knew Faith well enough not to take such a speech seriously, the image of her sister falling to her death went hurtling through her.

"Now dearest, what are you up to -ten, fifteen?" Faith asked her, seizing the brush.

"One hundred and seventy-five."

"Double oof," Faith exclaimed, with a repentant little grin. Faith Meredith had a way of making her smiling face mean all sorts of things. "Forgive me, won't you? I spied Dr Blythe on the Harbour Road and so had to go the long way."

"What about Jem?" Una asked her -not that Faith had said exactly who she was going to see this balmy April evening, but one glance at the girl told Una everything. Looking every bit the red rose Aunt Ellen's husband had called her all those years ago. Faith's mouth particularly, Una noticed, not just her lips but the skin all round it.

"Jem bowled straight over to him, of course. All 'Hail fellow, well met,' well _you_ know what Jem's like-" Faith babbled. "Never mind leaving _me_ to find another way home. Just like a-"

"_Man,_" Una said with her, imagining what Walter would have done in the same situation. Probably weave a ladder from his fingertips so that Faith could climb safely back to her room.

Faith commenced the brushing. It was a good thing Una had done most of the work because her sister worked over the same spot of her silky hair for the remaining twenty-five strokes, quietly humming through her other hand as it touched against her mouth.

"There! Now one braid or two, little darkling? How about one -goodness how long and thick it is. Tomorrow I might call up and ask you to let down your hair like that princess in the tower-"

"But that's Sunday," Una said.

"Yes, but Jem's not due back at Redmond until Tuesday this term-"

"No, I... I mean it's _Sunday,_" said Una again. It was all very well to keep the window open on Saturday night. But _not_ a Sunday. Because, well... because it was Sunday.

"Funny girl. God can see clear as clear what I get up to. We have no quarrel with each other -at least not now we don't," she added, thinking of her dear mother's grave on a heathery slope in Mayswater, "My chief concern are other more earth-bound eyes," she said cryptically, tying Una's hair with a double knot, before unravelling her own.

"Faith, you know I should always keep the window open for you, but I don't think-"

"Jem _kissed_ me!"

Una stood up abruptly. The floor seemed to lurch again, she remembered all those passengers -so far from home, so far from help- and went over to their little iron bed. _Kissed _you? she thought, bringing her fingers up to her lips, then just as quickly reaching for the puffy eiderdown and turning down the covers. Faith threw off her clothes and jostled in next to her.

"Oh Una, it was such a kiss!" Faith squealed. It was many actually. The whiskers on Jem's jaw grazing the skin all round her mouth. She hoped to goodness it didn't show in the morning, though right now she felt nothing but thrilled by the feel of that boy still upon her. "Remember he told us that he'd found an enormous beech?"

"With roses growing wildly underneath the canopy," Una replied.

"The very one."

"Though he never said where it was."

"N-no," Faith stammered, thinking it very unlikely he would now.

"This is our tree, Faith," Jem said, huskily, weaving his fingers with hers as he went to kiss her again ...and again ...and again. Her ear, her neck, her shoulder, the hollow at her throat, every finger and every finger-tip. But her mouth, flooded with blood, swollen and soft, he kissed most of all. And she kissed every part of him -well the parts that showed at least. Who would have thought such perfect ears could conjure such a perfect sound of longing when his lobe was pressed between her lips.

"So where is it?" Una asked, staring hard above her. The cracks in the plaster seemed to spread across the ceiling like so much ivy.

"Somewhere near Four Winds," Faith answered, vaguely. "It all gets a bit wild out there, excepting Miss Cornelia's, of course."

"I don't think her garden dares grow a new shade of green without her say so," Una giggled, nestling into her, wanting nothing so much than to guide their conversation to the comforting, comfortable talk. "Sometimes I wonder she doesn't sow it all to grass. Remember when the Elliots went to Halifax? And when they returned, her indignation that the shrubs and borders had dared grow in her absence. What did she say, 'So wild and unruly-'"

"Just like a man..." Faith said, dreamily. She buried herself under the quilt and closed her eyes. Her breaths soft and even, moving in and out like the curtain at the window.

Una tiptoed over to it and pulled it shut. The looking-glass rattled against the bureau drawer, she saw her brush was not put back in its right place and settled it next to the gilded hand-mirror. Una picked it up and glanced at her lips then slowly brought the glass to her mouth and kissed it. There was no heat, no warmth, no rough skin to make hers all red like her sister's. Just cold quicksilver and a flash of black hair. She blushed and peered round, shyly, but Faith was in dreams. Una crept in next to her and stroked her gold-brown hair as it fell down her back. Feeling the way Faith's body rose and fell and striving to breathe in time with her... twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three...

**… … …**

**The Manse, Glen St Mary; August 8th, 1914**

No sooner had Jerry arrived than Faith disappeared. At the click of the latch she dropped the tea towel, untangled herself from her apron and fled down the garden path. Una was picking them up when Private Gerald Meredith strutted into the kitchen.

"Atten -shun!" Carl yelled, and gave him a salute. "Goodness Jerry, you do look the business. Watch out, Kaiser, I say!"

"You look very smart," Rosemary agreed, placing a welcoming peck on his cheek, "I'll fetch your father, he's only up the road but I'll know he'll want to see you," and she smoothed back her flaxen hair.

Only Una might have noticed how her step-mother's hand trembled very slightly, but right at that moment her wide blue her eyes could not stop taking in the sight of Jerry in all that khaki. It was as though someone had put his rascally face on another man's body.

"You look all 'Miss Luna' when you stare at me like that," Jerry said, popping his cap on the kitchen table with a flourish. It struck him how odd it looked there, and he had a sudden inkling why so many heads turned as he and Jem marched home from the station. "Come give me one of your best little darkling hugs, Una Meredith. I shall need to stock up on them now."

Una stepped toward him shyly and was relieved to feel that inside that stiff woollen uniform -all those buttons and buckles- it _was_ Jerry after all. Not only his face, but all the way through. He held Una tightly, sweeping her up off the floor. But he didn't smell the way she remembered, he smelled of that unearthly green. A horrid murky colour that had no place among the harbour winds and late summer flowers.

"Not really my style, is it, U?" Jerry said, with a little lopsided smile, as Una went to fetch fresh water for the tea.

"Not at all, Jerry, you look very well in it," she murmured, lowering the kettle onto the stove top.

"Not really your style, then."

"Not really," she said, fetching his favourite cup from the little row of hooks fixed under the shelf where the tea things lived. "What are you in the mood for, Assam or Darjeeling?"

"Curiously the latter. The stuff they put on at the recruitment office could make your even _your_ hair go curly," he laughed, eyeing his sister's tightly bound coil. "I shall want all the sweet, soft comforts of home before the off."

"You mean to go soon-" Una said, just as Carl cut in, peering out from the Private's cap he'd popped on his head.

"Speaking of, where's that brown sweater of yours, I was wanting it for Sunday best. You never took it with you, did you?"

"Mitts off, scallywag!" Jerry replied, replacing his cap on his head, the exaggerated tilt just happening to hide his reddening face. "You're always nabbing my things."

"You won't be it wanting it now," Carl replied, as Jerry disappeared into the pantry, staring at the emptied shelves and never seeing them. Thinking only of how he had said the same thing to Nan. On the bridge. That sham of a smile she had given him when he saw her again in this kitchen. The tears he saw, never knowing if he was the cause of them or if they were all for Jem. What a rotten day it had been, for the first time in a long time Jerry had been glad of Ken's company on the train to Charlottetown. He really _was_ a lark, ol' Ford.

"Una, where are all the snowballs?" he asked, at last able to pop his face around the pantry door.

"Ah my son, my son!" John Meredith exclaimed, striding into the kitchen. He wrapped his arms around his boy and held him fiercely, as Rosemary laid claim to the tea pot. Una untied her apron and went up to her room.

**… … …**

**The Manse Glen St Mary, August 16th 1914**

She was at the bureau staring at the silver brush when Faith swept through the door.

"Oh, there you are! The Blythes are going home. Did you want to come down -no? You'll come tomorrow -to the station, won't you -to say farewell to the boys? But _of course_ you will, what am I saying! I'll be back in a tick-" and she flew back down the stairs.

A half hour later Una decided it was time to unweave the thick braids she had coiled round her head. Remembering how Walter had smiled at her tonight in that small way he always did now the Piper had called. She had been putting together the custard and preserves as Rilla, Di and Faith were chatting round the table, pretending to be useful. Seeking refuge from the war talk Walter came into the kitchen, and on spying the scene pulled a strand of Keats from his head as easily as someone else might pull strands from a hairbrush-

"Tender is the night/ And haply the Queen-Moon is on her throne/ Cluster'd round by all her starry Fays."

Una had peeked at him from behind the tray, the next lines of the poem going all through her-

But there is no light/ Through verdurous glooms and winding mossy ways...

She couldn't say it out loud, not when her heart beat like that, but with every glance of those menacing green uniforms did she think it_. _Walter never knew this of course, never suspected she knew one word. He just stuck his finger into her dish of stewed plums, popped one into his mouth, and disappeared into the back garden.

How Una had longed to do the same. She let her hair fall over her shoulders like a soft silk cloak and picked up her brush, knowing her sister would not come. Not when Jem was leaving tomorrow morning. Why would Faith waste one second doing something as childish as brush her sister's hair, when there was love -_love-_ to gather to herself the way Jerry was gathering the good tea and the baking tins in his trunk.

At stroke one hundred and seventeen her sister came up the stairs with such a slow distracted step Una expected to see Father enter the room. Faith fell back against the door as it closed and nestled her chin into her neck, remembering something or someone that had nestled there not long before. Una cradled her brush in her small, white hands, waiting to discover which way her sister would need her.

"Oh, Luna-Moon, don't look at me so. Even Jem can't make me cry the way you can. Will you let me brush your hair, I know I haven't done it properly for ages, can you forgive a goose like me?" Faith ducked down to study her sister's reflection in the looking-glass. "My goodness but you look breathtaking with your hair down like that. Why do you never wear it loose, it makes you look so beautiful."

Una knew this wasn't true. Not that Faith meant to be dissembling, it was only that there were so many other things her sister couldn't say. How strange this week had been, as one by one her old schoolyard friends went from flat caps and waistcoats to full suits of khaki. It had been hard enough to watch the transformation of Jerry. All he seemed to talk about now was the encampment at Valcartier. He who had never raised his hand in anger was about to have a rifle put into it. Una felt as though she was losing him already, and here was her sister having say goodbye to her brother _and_ her lover.

"Shall I brush your hair, Faith?" she asked her, gently, and was answered by two lithe arms wrapping tightly about her neck.

"How is it that you always know the right thing to do?"

She took Una's place at the piano stool and studied her reflection in the little oval looking glass, and then, as ever, poked her tongue out. Una had just loosened her toffee coloured hair when a stone tapped on the ivied window. Faith was peering out of it in the next second.

"Oh! Oh, it's Jem, it's Jem!" she exclaimed, joyfully, grabbing Una's embroidered shawl with its nightingales and butterflies, and draping it hastily about her shoulders. "Tell Father and Mother R I've gone to sleep, won't you, Una? They were hinting at looking in on me tonight and I wasn't sure -wasn't sure if Jem would come back."

"Of course, I will. And leave the window open -as always," Una said, softly.

"Thank you, thank you, Una! Tomorrow night, I promise. Tomorrow we'll do each others hair just like we used to do-" and she clambered over the window sill and disappeared down the ivy.

Una picked up the brush and looked in the mirror watching her mother's hands go through her hair. One hundred and eighteen, one hundred and nineteen, one hundred and twenty...

**… … …**

_fragment from a poem about Fern Gully, by Tropicana, 1902_

_fragment from Ode to a Nightingale, by John Keats, 1819_

_Thank you!_


	14. Song of Songs

**Song of Songs**

**T**

_In which Nan unravels; Faith and Jem undress; and Jerry unburdens his heart  
><em>

_**Ingleside, August 16th, 1914**_

"At long last!" Susan Baker exclaimed, on sight of her people coming up the slope to home, "Back from all your galavanting. I suppose you'll be wanting dessert."

Why the Merediths couldn't dine at Ingleside... Not that Una Meredith wasn't a creditable little cook, but everyone knew all their baking went to their flock -they probably had to serve fruit and cheese! Well, Susan would repair that oversight. All Jem's favourites were laid out in the dining room, the rhubarb glistened like toffee, the suet was cloud-like, the butterscotch sauce the exact shade of his sweetheart's hair. And on top of that there was ice cream!

The latter had been the reason Susan had declined the invitation to the Manse, for she had to keep it frozen yet creamily soft which took constant but careful stirring. It was a job -there were _thirty_ eggs in it- but nothing was too much trouble for little Jem.

"You do spoil us," Anne said, giving Susan her brightest smile, all the while wondering how she was going to manage more than a morsel.

That shadow of fear almost filled her now, yet strangely she felt all scraped out. Tomorrow Jem would be gone and Anne knew she would never be whole again until he came back. She watched Gilbert duck into his study and wished she had her own bolt hole to retreat to, when Rilla nestled into her, tucking her ruddy head against her mother's.

"Don't worry, Mother dearwums," she whispered, fondly, "You can pop your portion onto my plate, we mustn't let our Susan down."

Anne felt Rilla's kiss on her cheek and Di's hand clutching her own. "My darlings," she smiled, "sometimes I wonder if I didn't grow little girls at all, but little angels!"

There was the much missed sound of laughter and for the smallest moment her daughters saw the sadness that veiled their mother's eyes had lifted. They made their way to the dining room together, two boys following behind -the brown one applying a peck to Mother Susan's cheek as he stamped by. But Nan remained at the front door looking down the slope expectantly.

"Of all the nights for Jem to dawdle, the spotted dick'll be getting cold!" Susan grumbled, "What's keeping him, do you think?"

"He's with Faith, isn't he!" Nan snapped, then dropped her head, shamefacedly, and attempted to remove the hat pin from the crown of her hat. She couldn't make her fingers work and they fluttered in the gauzy veil. Gilbert appeared from the study, withdrew the carnelian pin and handed it to her.

"If you wished to remain longer, Nan, you need only have said. We should never have stopped you, anymore than we should stop Jem."

Nan tugged at her hat, the straw brim snagging painfully on her hair. She flung it at the coat stand and it fell into the umbrellas.

"But no one asked me to stay longer, did they!" she cried. Her father went to embrace her and she shuffled away, glaring at him and at Susan, who looked on with some consternation. "I don't want your arms, Father. And I don't want your pudding, Susan... There's only one thing I want... to be left _alone!_"

Anne came out of the dining room and went to follow Nan up the stairs when she felt Gilbert's hand at her shoulder.

"Leave her, Anne-girl," he said, "She'll be sorry for her outburst soon enough, let's not force it upon her. I must admit I am not sorry to see it. All this forced jollity -my face is beginning to hurt more than my heart."

**… … …**

Nan stood in the midst of her bedroom waiting for some well-meaning soul to enter and provide the shoulder she was to cry on. Not that she wanted one, of course. Until she stared at her door and realised that no one was coming after all. At least before there had been someone to rage at, however unfairly. Now she only felt angry at herself.

She had managed to avoid being alone with Jerry almost the entire evening, in fact ever since that morning on the Four Winds bridge. It did not matter that their destination had been the Lighthouse, whenever she recalled that day -and it was with an unrelenting frequency- she would always think of the bridge. The place where Jerry had touched her cheek and told her that he meant to be her rock.

Her _rock?_ Rocks stayed put. One could build upon a rock, take in a view upon a rock, be warmed upon a rock. A rock could not fling itself to the other side of the world. The boy obviously had rocks in his head!

If he had meant to be her rock then he would have stayed. But then... could she love a man who did not answer the call? Who was so small souled, as Father had described it, to put his own desires above the needs of his country? The answer, as desolate as it left her, was that she could not. It was not for nothing that she went to see the flag that morning, and who was the only other person who had turned up? Nan began to realise then that Jerry Meredith was not just dear to her, he was_ everything_ to her.

Because she _loved _him. She _loved_ Jerry Meredith, she knew that _now_. She also knew that to declare it now would seem like the worst kind of sentimental foolishness. What right did she have to tell him when at this very moment he must be summoning all his fortitude, all his courage, to leave behind a father who depended him, a family who feared for him? Una especially looked almost spooked, and little Bruce would not let go of his big brother's hand all evening. There was such a weight of responsibility on Jerry already. What should he do if she turned up on his doorstep with her bleeding heart -pack it away in his trunk with the socks and snowballs?

"Should we bake something for Jerry?" Rilla had asked her, striding into the kitchen with the same pair of socks she had started knitting three days before. "The Meredith pantry's always being raided by some hungry soul turning up for tea. I'm sure it's Una who is causing the Hodge boys to run all to fat. Donald Hodge is so enormous he had a whole school bench to himself! We might take some things to the Manse when we go there for supper, they wouldn't guess we were trying to bolster their shelves then."

"Why they should mind when they are always in need of bolstering... Still your way is certainly best. You do have a way of thinking things through, Rilla deary, that does credit to your age -though perhaps not to your knitting." Susan replied, eyeing the shapeless sock that had once again been abandoned, this time with the newspaper that lay on the cherrywood dresser. The week before Susan had tutted over the papers the Doctor left about the study, now she almost pulled them out of his hand. "What shall we make do you suppose?"

"Jerry is very fond of snowballs," Nan said, as though she was only mentioning the what day of the week it was.

He did like them, too. After their meal at the Manse Nan had been steadying herself to say goodbye to Jerry when she spied the tiniest flake of coconut by his dimple that wasn't quite -unless he made his lovely crooked smile. But Jerry wasn't smiling, he was thanking her for the cookies the way a poor parson might thank a wealthy patron for a new stained window.

Nan could only nod, and have everyone watch her nod, before making their way to the gate. It was then she moved closer to brush the little fleck away. Then Jerry moved closer... Her lips were by his ear when the softest, most anguished sound came from her. Something raw and wounded -and worse- wounding_, b_ecause as Jerry drew back he looked as though she had slapped him. Bruce started tugging on his big brother's arm, pulling him inside. And that was Nan's last image of him, being led into the house whilst never letting his eyes leave hers.

The Blythes walked back through the Valley, Nan lingering behind imagining that Jerry might run after her like the hero in those romantic novels, and whisk her up in his arms and... But he didn't come. And what was worse it was Jem who wove back through them all, declaring he could not bear to spend these last hours apart from Faith and didn't care who knew it. If anyone doubted their betrothal he had all but written it in the skies now. Mother and Father sharing bittersweet glances, saddened to miss their last moments with him yet happy to know their son knew what it was to love.

But she loved too.

Nan went to the the trunk at the end of the bed and flicked up the brass fixings, lifting up the leather bound lid with a trembling hand and pulling out Jerry's sweater. She touched the soft brown cashmere to her face, lingering around the collar where his throat would have rubbed against it and the scent of him was the strongest. There was rosemary there, and cedar, and something indefinable, she might spend her whole life trying to locate that smell. Inhaling it deeply -was it beeswax?- then dropping it as if somehow she might deplete the fragrance held within each stitch.

She put on her nightgown, extinguished the lamp and tucked herself into bed. Lying the sweater over Di's pillow so that now in the darkened room it was almost as though Jerry lay there with her. It looked something like his long lean body and Nan imagined what his face would look like as he slept next to her. Conjuring the memory of him sleeping on the bank of the Valley stream. It had been his first day back from Redmond and he was relishing an afternoon snooze having finally finished his epic dissertation on some contentious Bible translation. He said that in dreams he spoke Hebrew.

Nan was supposed to be tending the fire. Instead she fancied earth's first man could not have looked as beautiful as he did, smooth cheeked and black lashed. Nan had been batting away a dragonfly from his face when Jerry awoke and stared up at her with a vulnerable intensity she had never forgotten. Then he closed his eyes and rolled onto his stomach. Half an hour later he was batting away more than dragonflies when he discovered that Carl had painted a plum jam moustache under his nose.

She slid her hand over the pillow imagining his soft, nervous breaths under her fingers. Imagining the feel of his mouth on hers, as a tender ache went through her. No, not through her, it bloomed outward. She felt like a bell waiting to be struck, like a door waiting for the hand that will knock:

I slept but my heart was awake/ When I heard my lover knocking/ My hands dripped with perfume/ My fingers dripped with myrrh/ I pulled back the bolt/ I opened to my lover/ But he was gone...

This was what he had written, she had seen it for herself. Those... _words_ in his own indigo scribble; Nan Blythe reading them with a racing heart whilst visiting the rooms her brother shared with Jerry at Redmond. "Not for your eyes, little sister," Jem winked, snatching it from her. She was too shocked to argue with him. What on earth was Jerry Meredith working on? She never remembered reading _this_ in the bible. Not she ever needed to, the words were burnt into her.

That agonised sound weighed heavily upon Nan and she nuzzled into the sweater to muffle it. If this was Jerry she would have heard his heart thrumming through them both, just as the hours were ticking away. Di must come to bed soon. Every night this week her twin had rocked and sang to her as though she was a little child. But Nan didn't need Di now. Her touch wasn't enough, her pillow wasn't enough, and anyway Di was certain to burst in any moment and wonder, quite rightly, why there was a sweater pulled over it.

Nan removed it and before she could admit to herself what she was doing, whipped her nightgown over her head and pulled the sweater over her bare skin. She fell against her pillow and wept. What would it have felt like to be in his arms? Would he have held her with a strong stillness like Mother, gently stroked her back like Father? Or was there another way, another world she might have known? She lay on her stomach, tears trickling onto her pillow. And when Di came in at last she found her sister sleeping with her arms wrapped tight about herself in a boy's brown sweater.

**… … …**

The earth smelt rich and moist, layered with leaves and petals in a carpet of musk and dew. Roots from the tree above snaked through the soil and clawed at the ground, while branches spread wide and swayed with a rasping murmur, falling and rising with the wind.

Another sound united with it, an urgent, secret sigh. A cheek pressed into damp moss and rose heads; white knuckled hands grasping at tree roots; fingers clutching at the world as though trying to keep it turning to another day. Her voice thick and hot, never caring who might hear or what might come.

No one else came here. No one but Jem would have wanted to know what lay beyond the thorny hedge. No one but Faith would have followed him. It was here under this ancient beech that he kissed her for the first time, though not quite as he kissed her now. It was their Eden, their secret. Sticky, sweaty, and deliciously sweet. So sweet Faith almost couldn't bear it, pulling roughly at his auburn hair and perfect ears. He flinched suddenly, peering up at her, and though she could not see it Faith could feel him smiling. She looked up at their tree and started to cry.

Jem didn't know this yet and after a cursory feel of his right ear, nuzzled into her again. When Faith began to move unexpectedly he stopped. She didn't respond when he said her name.

"What, what is it?" Jem asked her. He leaned up on his elbow, a chill slicing through him when he saw her face.

Faith wept brokenly, shuddering against the ground as old rose petals, so dry they were almost black, dotted her cheek. Jem slid himself up her body, brushing them away, before anointing her temples with his soft, wet mouth.

"Faith, please. What's happened?"

"I -I'm sorry. I never meant- I wasn't going to... " she pressed her lips together to stop another sob as Jem wiped away her tears. "I swore to myself that if _you_ have the courage to leave then the least _I_ can do is not blub. I don't know why... but when I felt my ring catch your ear I couldn't stop it. I never knew there was such a flood inside and it hurts, it hurts..."

"It hurts me, too," Jem said, softly, rolling next to Faith and laying his head by hers. He reached for her unbuttoned blouse and pulled it over her. His hand lingered on her breast and he watched it rise and fall as her body found calm.

"You're not bleeding are you?"

Jem grinned at her. "I didn't mean my ear hurt, you silly cabbage. I meant _here._" He brought Faith's hand to his chest.

Faith looked at her fingers pressed against his crumpled khaki shirt, and at the ring he had discovered on the shores of Four Winds. "I couldn't find a pearl," he'd winked, as he slid it over her finger.

It had fitted her perfectly and looked more lovely than he expected. It was supposed to be a bit of boyish fun, yet the creamy shell looked so right on Faith's hand Jem almost regretted the day he would replace it with something valuable. To Faith it was just another one of Jem's miracles. The way he could see the beauty in something that anyone else would walk straight past. All the world was good in his eyes, to be loved by such a man was to never feel want.

"I don't want pearls, or rubies or gold. I'll never take it off!" she vowed -though she _did_ move it to her other hand before clambering up to her window that evening. "I don't want anything, Jem. Except for you to come back to me."

Then Jem had woven his hand with Faith's and as he felt his ring upon her finger was almost sick with desire. Covering her face and her hair with kisses until the tide had soaked their boots.

He kissed her now, savouring the salt on her skin and wishing stupidly for a way to take something of her with him. Faith stared at her ring and frowned.

"No! Jem... it's broken." She pressed her fingers over it in a panic, there was crack in the shell which must have caught on Jem's ear.

"It doesn't mean anything, it's just a shell-"

Faith pulled herself up and tried to twist the ring from her finger when it split apart in her hand. She froze, her blouse falling from her shoulders and her face filled with dread. "What if it _does_ mean something-"

Jem leaned up next to her, twitting her nose affectionately. "You've been spending too much time with Gertrude Oliver."

The corners of her mouth turned upward, but her eyes were flooding again. "It _did_ mean something, it marked me as yours," she said, hoarsely, "I want to be yours, Jem."

"You are mine, Faith-"

"Not like that, not with words. I want to be _yours,_" her gold eyes hard, almost angry. "I want you to mark me, I want that scar. Because at least if I never have you then I will have that."

"I don't understand," Jem lied.

"All these things we've been doing. Going so far-"

"We've gone further than we ever should," he said, eyeing Faith's drawers around her ankles.

"Because we thought we had so long to wait. Do you know how long we might have to wait now? Eternity. And before you tell me I'm being dramatic you should remember that I know what eternity feels like. I've already lost someone I love." Faith looked up through the canopy of leaves but there were no stars tonight. A thick cloud hung heavy in the skies and she wished it would stay dark forever, that the new day might never dawn. "Sometimes I can barely remember her. Sometimes I find myself studying Carl the way he studies butterflies, trying to catch just a glimpse." Faith wiped her eyes again. "If something should happen to you and all I have to remember you by is a broken piece of shell..." She let the ring fall into her lap, bringing his hands to where the pieces lay. "Please Jem. Let me be marked by you."

Faith felt so hot under his touch Jem Blythe was about to combust. As dazed by her candour as his own desire, words tumbling out of him before he knew what he was saying.

"I hardly need convincing. There are times I can barely walk home, nights I have to climb out of my window even when I know that I won't see you because I can't stop thinking about you. And lately... I never thought I would tell you this," Jem flushed with embarrassment, "I've had dreams where I don't come back... that I die... but I can still see you, Faith, and it's worse than death-"

"That will _never_ happen!" Faith declared, clutching at him. He took her hands in his own, kissing each palm and then looked up at her.

"I still can't believe you love me."

"I have always loved you-"

"But Faith, let us be honest with each other now. There are no guarantees..."

"I am going to be your wife!"

"I gave you a _shell. _Another man could give you diamonds."

Faith rolled her eyes and Jem turned away, gazing into the thicket of rose and hazel that grew beyond their tree. Wondering how it would feel to know someone looked back who meant him nothing but harm. He had no right proposing. He had been madly impulsive in that moment and desperately wanted to be madly impulsive again. It must not happen. That was what Jem told himself as he stared into darkness. How much easier to tell the pitiless black than it would be to tell the girl beside him.

She was lying back in her undone blouse and rucked up skirts, her long, loose hair spilling round her shoulders like the roots of a tree. As Jem turned back to her all the awkward eagerness that blighted his beginnings as her lover flooded through his body, and he wanted nothing so much as to fall into her. The look in his hazel eyes told Faith as much, she reached out to him and he forced himself to shift away. It hurt to hold it in. But he had also made a promise to himself.

"You are so bright and good. I hate to think of you forsaking all the possibility, all the regard that is due to you because I -I because I was your first."

She smiled at him. It was not the demure smile of a maid but as one who knew him, not only as his lover but as his best and most beloved friend. When Faith Meredith said she would fight by his side she had meant it.

"You daft carrot," she sighed, kneeling up next to him and taking his face in her hands. "You might be able to find the first of the mayflowers and the last of the strawberries, yet you can't see what's right in front of you. You are not just my first. You are my _only_, James Matthew."

He never could make her do one thing she didn't want to do nor stop her once she had set her heart on something. For all her beauty it was her spirit that he loved most. Though all he could say was-

"You are my only, Faith Cecilia."

Jem grinned with such a happiness he could barely kiss her, nuzzling his face into her throat and her soft gold hair. Faith's breaths came shallow against his ear, their fingers entwined, then arms, then legs. A shoe was loosened, another button. Clothes in a tangle of white and khaki, a buckle at his waist and a ribbon at hers. Petals on their skin and sweet red earth. Messy, mussy and marking them forever.

**… … …**

Jerry Meredith stared out the window and sucked on the end of his pen. Rosemary was in the graveyard far below him laying out a saucer of milk for the strays, and picking out the wilted flowers in the few posies left by the tombstones. It was her nightly ritual when the evenings wore long, and if there were no flowers to tend she would pick at the lichen growing over the markers of the dearly departed. Jerry stared back into his room, looking as stripped clean as one of Mother R's stones, and at the blank sheet of paper sitting on his desk.

_Dear Nan,_ he wrote in a shaky hand, and crossed it out impatiently, reaching for another sheet from the stationery Una had given him. It had been packed away in his trunk for all of four hours before he had sought it out. The creamy watermarked paper so much lovelier than the stuff he scrawled on at Redmond -he wasn't taking lecture notes after all. He was... he was... What was he doing, exactly? A thick blot of purplish ink bled into the paper as he began to write her name again. He threw it aside and took out another piece-

_Dearest Nan... _no, _Darling Nan... _perhaps _To Miss Blythe? _Yes Jerry, you dolt, that sounded very romantic, as though you were trying to get an increase on Father's stipend!

_Dear Miss Blythe, this is to inform you that I am maddened with such desire I fear this page should ignite at any moment. Yours etc, Mr G.J. Meredith._

Idiot! Yet what relief to write the words, reading over those lines again and again until he pushed his chair back abruptly and went back to the window. A breeze entered the room and showed him some mercy, touching his hot face with a silken coolness, and he breathed it in until he felt able to sit again. Somehow he must find the words and find them soon. He had already wasted too much time debating whether he should write anything at all. All those reasons and excuses tugging and teasing him -he had no right... it might be his last chance... what was the use... he would always regret... In the end he came to the conclusion that he would never sleep until he got something down on paper. He could at least do that, it did not mean he had to give it to her.

What would he write to Nan knowing that she would never see it?

_Nan Blythe, I know you love me. I see it in your eyes. Not because of the way you look at me but because of the way that you don't. The way your dark, downy lashes fall whenever I come near you. The way you stare at me when you think I have forgotten you are there. Don't you know that I can feel it as easily as if it was your hand upon me? And every time I am fighting myself not to look back at you. I want to, I could devour you I am that hungry for any little scrap you toss my way. Yet I daren't. It hurts too much when you turn away._

This was no great characterisation of their friendship these past six years, only of these past six days. How else to account for the way she avoided him at every opportunity? He would not tell himself those easy, modest falsehoods anymore; that her coolness and her distance meant she didn't care, that he had been a fool, had assumed too much. Because he _knew_ it down to that dimple that wasn't, Nan Blythe wanted him as much as he wanted her.

Jerry scraped his chair back a second time, he never could sit when he felt like this, and gripped at the window ledge. He could just go to her. There was no way for him to get down to the garden from his room. But he could slip out from the girls' window, he might even collide with Faith on the way down. Father never suspected, of course. And Jerry could never bring himself to ask Mother R if she knew of his sister's escapades. Well, it would be an uncomfortable conversation for one. But also there was part of him that didn't half admire Faith's adventurous spirit, the way she flouted all those stuffy conventions. This was the 1900s after all.

In fact he needn't shimmy down the ivy vines, he could just go down the stairs and pick up the telephone. He stared out to the darkening sky and tried to imagine what might happen if he attempted such a thing-

"Yes, good evening, Dr Blythe. No, there's nothing the matter at the Manse, we are all well. I was wanting to speak to your daughter, to- to Nan. She has a sweater of mine and... I suppose she _could_ bring it with her to the station tomorrow. No, you are right, of course. So sorry to disturb, goodnight."

Unbearable. To say nothing of the titters from those who were listening in on the shared line. A letter it must be. And such a letter, to make up for all the kisses, all the embraces he might never share with her.

_My Darling Girl -_this was perhaps assuming too much, she hadn't yet said she was his. Just _Darling Girl _then.

_Darling, darling, darling girl. Your deep brown_ _eyes are my harbour, my homecoming, the peace in my heart. Your sweet lips like a scarlet ribbon, your neck as lithe and creamy as the birch..._

Jerry put the pen down once more. He was going to mention gazelles in a minute. Her breasts like twin fawns bobbing up and down in the meadow, her breasts soft and velvety, her breasts bound in her old fashioned corsets so that every breath made them rise up like creamy half moons bursting under her lacy blouse... Why was he doing this to himself? If he was to write then he should write, get the bally thing over with, and go to bed.

That the real problem. Wasn't he writing this infernal letter because he couldn't bear the thought of lying there unable to stop himself thinking of her? Not her soft eyes, or her slender neck, or even her exquisite breasts, but that sound she had made as she tried to say goodbye to him tonight. One that expressed all the longing, all the feeling, all the love that existed between them yet had always been ignored. And now, _now_, when he was just hours from leaving she had leaned into his neck and... Had it been a murmur? But no words had been said. A moan? But with such an earthly want. A regret, yes he heard her regret. But hope also. A pure, unyielding hope.

Jerry knew it was not so much what Nan said as the meaning behind it. He had translated enough dry scholarly prose into its original, living, breathing text to know that a pomegranate was not just a pomegranate. He sat back in his chair and let his memories of her go through him. Her quick laugh, and her quicker tongue, her sharp mind and her tender heart.

_Oh Nan, my sweet, my all. I have found the one my soul doth love. You are beautiful, there is no flaw in you..._

The door sounded now, a rumbly-knuckled knock that was John Meredith's. Jerry tucked his letters under a book and himself under his desk.

"Y-yes, Father."

"Hello son, I saw a light under the door."

"Please, come in. I'm not in bed yet," Jerry smiled, motioning his father into the room.

"You're just like me," John said, gesturing to the desk as he sat on the bed. Jerry was the very image of his father, their black eyes and black hair, no one in the Glen could see them without pulling out that old adage about apples and trees. Anyone who knew them, however, could not fail to notice it was the quality of blackness that mattered. Jerry all firey coals to his father's limpid deeps. "I never could go to bed until I had all my thoughts in order," John continued and Jerry grinned at him, whilst wondering if that was the case how his father got any sleep at all.

"I was tidying up some loose ends," he said, shoving the book further away, "notes and whatnot."

"Rosemary wanted me to... to give you this," John reached into the bulging pocket of his black jacket and shuffled about, eventually bringing out a handful of things he could not make head nor tail of. A tiny seed envelope, now empty -though whether they had made it to ground or were trying to plant themselves in John's pocket was unknown. Two ribbons in scarlet and blue often used to mark his place in some great tome. Acorn cups, no doubt from a game with Bruce. An iridescent feather -this would be for Carl, until he finally spied it among three copper pennies.

"St Christopher," Jerry exclaimed, taking the medallion from his father's hand.

"Indeed, the very chap," John replied, gathering up the treasures. "Forget-me-nots?" he said, baffled by its presence. "You want to give her these instead of a letter, Jerry," and he peered into the empty packet.

"Sorry?"

"Not that there's much chance of her forgetting. I am glad there is at least one unknown now answered for me."

Jerry caught his meaning immediately and hoped his father had not sensed his own thoughts when he entered the room. He turned his attention to the medal, tracing a finger over a tiny relief of the saint of safe travel pressed into the bronze disk. "Don't be afraid for me, Father. I know what I am doing."

"You were always one for knowing your own mind -and for speaking it." He nudged his son's shoulder, affectionately. "There's such great promise in you, Jerry. Your drive, your comprehension of the world, your incredible knowledge of things-"

"Dusty, bookish things. I shall never have your talent for converting petty minds into repentant hearts. I don't think I should ever learn it even if I stayed by your side all my life."

"I wouldn't worry on that score, I never learned it at my father's knee. It was your dear mother taught me that. And Rosemary... Were it not for your stepmother..." Now it was John who blushed, he made a small cough as he searched for the right words. Others often assumed John Meredith was shy or lost track of his thoughts, it was only that he needed the time to know what must be said. "It's one thing to know _how_ to get something done, something else entirely to understand _why_. Rosemary is my why."

John had been worrying the cuffs of his sleeve as he spoke, and he looked up to see a queer look pass over Jerry's face. The same one he wore when Bruce dragged him inside earlier that evening.

"I think Jerry needs God's liver oil," the little boy whispered, importantly, into John's ear, "he looks all sick. P'raps he can't go now, Father, d'you think?" unable to hide the hope in his wee voice. It was such fun to have a real live soldier in the house. Until Bruce worked out that it wasn't the kitchen that needed soldiers but some faraway in England man and that's where Jerry would be going too.

Jerry stared at the desk, he placed the St Christopher's medal upon it and ran his hand over the beaten walnut top. John saw the boy knew what he wanted to say. Not to him, these words were meant for someone else. For an autumnal maid who had looked bleakest winter all evening. He pressed his thumb over the smudge of ink on Jerry's chin.

"Hold onto your why, son, and I shall never fear for you." They stood up and John shook his son's hand firmly, then gave way to all the feeling inside and hugged him hard. "Don't forget who you are fighting for," he said. It was not until he'd left the room that Jerry noticed that his father had left the seed packet in his hand.

_Dearest Nan,_

_Tomorrow I shall leave this beauty to become a soldier. I shall learn how not to ask questions, how to follow instead of lead, how to destroy instead of cherish, how not to be as I am. I do it because I cannot face the alternative, I cannot live in a world that will not meet evil with a willing heart and a belief they can overcome it. I want what is good in this world to remain, if not for me, then for you. _

_You are the reason I am able to do this, and the reason that I will do it. You are my why, Nan Blythe. You always have been. You never would let me rest upon all that dusty, bookish knowledge, as you call it, without coming at me again and again with another of one of your whys. You'll never know what you have pushed me to be and to become, though I hope one day you might. Until that one day,_

_Ever yours and God Bless, _

_Jerry_

**… … …**

_Song of Songs is in the old testament and celebrates the physical love between a man and a woman. Read the New Living translation if you want a good idea of how superbly erotic it is. Fragments of this are featured throughout this chapter but are not asterisked as the whole thing would start to look a bit like a starry sky.  
><em>

_Thank you for reading and for all your comments._**  
><strong>


	15. The Sons and Daughters of Hungry Ghosts

_With love and gratitude to L.M.M. -everything is hers, only this idea is mine_

_I make an Over-Harbour joke at Ethel Reese's expense in this chapter. I thought as she lived near the Wests she would have attended the Over-Harbour school, though if she is sister to Dan she must have gone to the Glen school. For the sake of my joke let's say she moved there_**  
><strong>

**The Sons and Daughters of Hungry Ghosts**

_In which Ethel Reese changes her mind; Di Blythe makes up her mind; and Ken Ford comes to the end of the line  
><em>

_**Glen St Mary Station; August 17th 1914**_

With every step he took toward the buggy Ken Ford could feel a pair of golden brown eyes burning into his back. He clicked at the horse impatiently and yanked on the reins, the horse gave a snort and started down the Harbour Road with a jolt -much to the satisfaction of the girl next to him, who clutched ever tighter at Ken's arm.

"Oh Ken, put your arm around me, won't you? I feel so faint with the pain of these terrible goodbyes, I fear I might fall off the buggy," Miss Reese cooed. Her fingers slid round Ken's bicep and he sent another bad tempered tug to Smoky.

"I would certainly endanger you even more if I took my hands off the reins, Ethel, I'm not familiar with the temperament of this beast." Her pale blue eyes sized up the old nag, knowing it had about as much chance of bolting as Ken Ford did on his poor sore ankle. "Why don't you put your head down between your knees, see if that helps?" Ken suggested.

Ethel Reese had no intention of putting her head thus. Her mother had her up so early this morning she'd needed candles to see by, and was not about to muss one sandy curl on her perfectly coiffed head now that the reason for all that preening had agreed to escort her home. A cold wind went through her, the kind so sharp as to cut right through a body, and she shivered unhappily in her best chantilly, her lace gloved hands attempting to erase the gooseflesh on her arms.

"Be a gentleman and keep me warm, at least," she said with a sniff.

Ken pulled Smoky to a stop and began to unbutton his blazer when another girl approached them.

"Hello, you two," Di exclaimed, hoping to sound jollier than she felt -or was she hoping to sound less? She didn't know anymore. She had never felt more catawampus in her life. "Got room for one more?"

"Can do," Ken replied, stretching past Ethel to help Di up. "We don't mind, do we, Miss Reese?"

Ethel gave a small smile, at least now there was no reason for her not to snuggle into Mr Ford, though she wished she hadn't been so eager to don his candy stripes. She must look ridiculous next to bonny Miss Blythe, whose turquoise jacket and cap made her eyes look like shining pools of green. Di really was very pretty when you saw her up close. "Not at all," she said, "though I must say, I _am_ surprised you could leave your family at such a time."

Not that the Blythes had countenanced the shedding of even one tear. Their steady devotion to giving the boys a cheery farewell didn't half grate on the girls who had hoped to cry on _someone's_ shoulder. Honestly, Ingleside and the Manse were like their own little kingdom, so well satisfied with themselves! _Other_ men had left this morning, not just Jem and Jerry. Ethel sidled further into Ken's rather muscular arm. This morning had taken such a lot out of her. If only Dan had take the trouble to enlist, then they would see how she truly suffered. Di, on the other hand looked almost cavalier about the whole thing.

"Won't they miss you, Di, dear?"

"I shouldn't think so," Di admitted, frankly, "Faith and Nan are off to the Manse," -where _someone_ had left _something_ for her sister- "Mother and Rilla are collecting for the Red Cross. And the boys, well..." Di shared a look with Ethel, both agreeing on this if nothing else; that boys could disappear as and when they chose, there was never any call to account for what _boys_ got up to. In fact, Di had been wondering whether now might be the time to find out what one boy in particular had been doing since she had last seen him walk out of her school house nearly half a year ago. "I was thinking of checking on the building progress at Over-Harbour. They are to have the topping out ceremony next week, I hear-"

"Not thinking of extending your contract are you?" Ken cut in, he leaned forward to give Di a look of disdain.

"No fear! It's Redmond for me. But now that I think of it," Di grinned, raising her eyebrows, "why don't _you_ apply, Mr Ford? They have yet to secure a new teacher. What do you say, I'm sure you'd make short work of the teaching license course at Queens. Could be the making of you!"

"Minx! You can get off this contraption if you keep that up. Teach a lot of snotty farm brats!"

"I went to Over-Harbour," said Ethel, coolly.

"As does Ken's own cousin, Frank," Di laughed, "He really is incorrigible, isn't he Ethel?"

Ethel Reese was not inclined to answer one way or the other, though she did inch away from Ken's 'rather muscular arm' just a fraction. Di and Ken continued a tit-for-tat conversation over the girl all the way to the village; Ethel never dreaming that in one short ride she would be more inclined to Di's company than Ken's. How Di teased him and how Ken deserved it. Was there anything the matter with his foot at all? It was Di's hand she reached for as she alighted, bundling the silly blazer into Di's lap. Ethel had intended to keep hold of such a prize and make Ken come fetch it. But not now. What a peacock he was -the silk lining must have cost more than her whole dress!

"Take care, Di," she said, by way of goodbye. Let that serve Kenneth Ford as warning that Ethel Reese would be taking _much care_ from now on. My goodness, but he would have to do something extraordinary to make it up to her. Snotty? Bratty? The hide of the man!

Ken shuffled along the seat of the buggy, bestowing Di with a devilish wink. He noticed she wasn't looking at him but up ahead to a lone lombardy, once ragged and wild, now hacked down to little more than a stump. Beyond it were the skeletal beginnings of a new school house, its roof beams awaiting their shingles like hands in a game of 'Here is the church, here is the steeple'. There were no people inside it, however, only ghosts that Di was now afraid she was not ready to see. As they drew nearer she spied the old store cupboard, its doors ripped off and shelves removed, lying on its side with the branches from the cut down tree. It would serve as firewood for the brand new stove. All Miss Blythe's hopes gone to dust, just like those of Mrs Reese.

"Good God, it's tiny," Ken remarked, as they drew up to the building site.

"Looks to be almost twice the size of the place that was there before. I am half afraid there won't be the men to finish it now." Di drew her knees closer, rubbing her hands over her linen skirts. She thought of the handful of soldiers who had left the Glen today, knowing in her heart it would be the beginning of an exodus.

Would _he_ go too? He would be eighteen in three months. Would he stay to milk cows as he said he would? Could such a life satisfy him or did he appear as if he wanted to go? She might have known the answer to this last question had she simply looked over at him. Yet when Di lingered on the platform with her family watching the train carry her brother away she found she could not trust herself to acknowledge his presence. Though she felt him. Even now it was if his hand pressed upon her jacket.

"Did you want to take a gander?" Ken asked her, sliding into his blazer. He tethered the horse to a fence more post than picket, then offered his hand to Di.

They walked around the grounds, it did not take long yet it might have been hours. It felt that way to Ken who had given up on 'teacher dear' and leaned against the tree stump. An older woman appeared behind a juniper hedge chatting with a younger man who was wheeling his bicycle.

"Morning to you!" she greeted him, in typical Island fashion.

Ken made a brief nod and continued working out a clump of dandelions with his good foot. The woman stopped, the wind plastering her silver hair across her brows which furrowed with blatant interest. The boy put the stand down on his bike on the unspoken understanding that they were going to stay put the moment.

"You're Martin's cousin, aren't you? My boy here went to school with his Frank. Name's Jessie O'Ryan."

"Yes, Leslie West is my mother," was Ken's well used answer. He felt himself studied and because he was bored decided to continue the conversation. "I was just admiring the progress on the school house."

"Ain't it grand? A proper building now, not some itty shack as was there before."

"I was saying how modest it seemed," Ken began, then smiled generously, deciding not to add that his boarding school had bigger bathrooms than that schoolhouse.

"And who were you sayin' that to?" Mrs O'Ryan asked him, though there were piles of lumber and shingles about, not another soul was to be seen.

"To a teacher that once worked here. A Miss Blythe. We've just come from the station. Her brother has joined up and she had a sudden yen to see her old stomping ground."

"Miss Blythe! Oh, we saw her, didn't we, Gilbert? I pointed her out by her pretty red hair."

"We did, Mother," the boy replied, eyeing the obviously handsome, clearly wealthy young man Diana Blythe now kept company with. Despite this he found himself tucking in his shirt and running his tongue over his teeth. Looking without trying to seem as if he did, in search of another glimpse of her. Di was so much smaller than Ken no one noticed her approach until her turquoise cap appeared behind Ken's shoulder.

"Miss Blythe!" Mrs O'Ryan cried, "What an unexpected pleasure. I was just saying to Leslie West's boy-" -Ken huffing at the name every Over-Harbour dweller called him on discovering his parentage- "we saw you at the station just now. Couldn't get this lummox to say hello, though, could I?" she chuckled, nudging her son's brown arm.

Di's windblown, dusty heart congealed into a hot mess at the sight of that lummox. "Good morning, O'Ry- er... Mrs O'Ryan. Good morning, Gilbert."

"Hello Diana."

Ken Ford and Jessie O'Ryan gave the boy such looks now, Jessie's more of an _Oh no!_ to Ken's _So ho!_ Di merely cursed herself in her choice of hat, knowing the colour must highlight how scarlet her cheeks had just become.

"Forgive my son, Miss Blythe. Just 'cause he's the man of the house now he's taking on airs he has no right to" her crinkling eyes belying the pride she had in him. "You'll have seen that my Ignatius has enlisted too-"

"Yes, congratulations!" Di blurted before she could stop herself. Ken could only stare -what on earth had come over the unflappable Di Blythe!

"Indeed," Ken said, attempting to cover his friend's nonsensical comment, "he _is_ to be congratulated. I only wish I had half his luck -bust my foot last winter, unfortunately. Bad tackle by some Ottawa thug. I only hope this war continues long enough for my sorry self to have a chance to serve."

Di dared to look at O'Ryan for any evidence that he shared Ken's views. But for some reason best known to himself he said to Ken, "You play for Ottawa?"

Ken sniffed sharply and glared at the boy. "Hardly."

"Then I take it you're a Red?"

"A Blue. Toronto's my burg."

"Don't look a thing like Leslie, does he?" said Jessie, in a cosy manner that made Ken feel invisible. "There's a sister, though, isn't there? A pretty yellow haired maid, had a peculiar name... Now _she_ is the spit of her mother. Leslie West was the beauty of the Glen. T'was so sad what happened to her when she was a girl-"

"I agree, Mrs O'Ryan," said Di, going cold with every word the woman said. "Her mother should have protected her better than she did."

"Yes, oh, I suppose..." Jessie mumbled, fussing over a brown lock that had fallen over her son's brow. "It all turned out for the best in the end. Good day to you, Miss Blythe, Leslie West's boy."

O'Ryan flicked up the stand of his bicycle with a practiced kick then tugged at his cap, his eyes peering out with a lucid green. "Good bye, Leslie West's _boy_... Goodbye Diana," and ran off join to his mother along the fork that lead to Mason's pond.

Well... that seemed to be that. Di knew no more about O'Ryan's future than she did last week. He was still the puckish, infuriating boy he had always been. Though he would hardly look at her, could barely bring himself to meet her eyes. Preferring anywhere else, her shoes, her hair, her turquoise hat -he had stared at that for a long time.

Ken interrupted her thoughts with a sigh of contempt. "And _that_ is the reason I'm going home on Thursday!"

"Poor Ken," Di smirked, "are the Over-Harbour folk too rough on you?"

"_Leslie West's boy..._" he muttered, adjusting his boater so it tilted just so.

"And so you are!"

The green in Di's eyes seemed to laugh at him, and he noticed there was a dusky pink to her cheek that had little to do with the wind. There was nothing pinched about her at all, rather the more Ken looked at her the more she seemed to glow.

"You also have a different appellation," -an _apple_-lation was closer to it, Di was sure she looked as red and blue as Ken's blazer- "that short lad calls you Diana."

Di unpinned her cap as the breeze whipped up from the sea, gathering speed through the open fields. "That was just a old joke..." she said softly, smoothing the felt brim with her hand.

How much she reminded Ken of her little sister, lowering her lashes to conceal her longing the way a cloud conceals the sun. She looked luminous, so different to the Di he'd always known. The words -the ridiculous, unexpected, inexcusable words: _May I kiss you?_ began to form in his mouth. He really was an unreconstructed cad. Ken felt inside the pocket of his trousers and brought out his cigarette case. Di attempted to shelter the flame as he struck a match and he waved her away.

"Funny sort of joke between a pupil and a teacher, wouldn't you say?" he said, through a thick exhalation of smoke.

Di wrinkled her nose, liking neither the smell nor the question. "Whatever are you implying?"

Evidently, Di Blythe was every bit the fool that he was, clearly gone all to pieces over some unsuitable youth. If he made fun of her now he was merely being cruel to be kind. "Well, Diana killed Orion, didn't she? Shot an arrow straight at his head."

Di gave no sign that she had heard him, her finger drawing across the little silver arrow that was pinned to her hat. She removed the brooch and attached it to her lapel, then looked up at him again, an irrepressible smile on her face.

"Ken, be a dear. Ring through to Ingleside for me and say you've invited me for dinner?" She did not wait for an answer but strutted purposefully toward the fork in the red dirt road.

"Wha- Where are you going?" Ken called after her.

She turned back and blew him a kiss. "Hunting!"

**… … …**

Monday luncheon was doused in gravy, while Mim West waited for Ken to signal when she should stop pouring it over his potatoes. He didn't even noticed it spilling onto the tablecloth, no doubt due to the eldest Blythe lad heading off to Valcartier this morning.

"Don't take it so to heart, Ken dear, yer bound to get yer chance." Ken raised his eyebrows in assent, his cousin taking this to mean he would like another helping of creamed peas. "Got to keep yer strength up, yer ankle'll never heal otherwise," she added, mindful of the assurance she had given Leslie that her son would come back good as new once the Island did its work. He might have, too, if he had stayed as long as he'd meant to. It was a shame to be cutting the holiday short. Who would have thought when he arrived at the station with three embossed trunks and a gramophone she would grow so fond of little Ken.

The front door sounded and she went to give Ken her usual look before shooing away another lass, when to her gaping surprise young Romeo up and answered it himself. Well, if that wasn't that a turn up! Perhaps there was someone in the Glen who would give him a reason to stay after all.

Ken opened the door, Di Blythe standing on the porch steps just as he'd expected. He was about to make some teasing remark when she stepped forward and slapped him hard across the face. His hand went up to his cheek, his face pure amazement. Usually when he received a reprimand like this knew full well what brought the lady to it. But this... this was- this hurt the way he supposed it was always meant to hurt. He felt shamed and angry. What on earth had he done? Surely she had not seen that moment of weakness. He certainly had no desire to kiss her now.

Di stepped back, uncertain what would happen next. The look on Ken's face as he touched his fingers to a nasty red mark was mortifying. She had imagined she would feel gratified, instead she felt as though he'd slapped her back.

"What in blazes, Di," he whispered, aware enough to know that he did not want Mim brought to the door as well.

Di hovered on the steps, half thinking she might run down them and escape, then steeled herself to speak.

"You're going on Thursday." Ken stood there, saying nothing; whatever could be said about such an obvious remark? "And you -you... you haven't told Walter, have you?"

Ken's right cheek now matched his left. It was a conversation he had been putting off, and in the end decided to pass on the information to Rilla. The look in her eyes had been bad enough. But Walter looked so dark and damned at the station Ken could not bring himself to tell him he had made up his mind to leave.

"Walter thinks you're staying on for the rest of the summer, Ken, did you know that? You did know that, didn't you.? You let him think it, you let Rilla think it... I'm ashamed of you, Ken Ford."

Di brushed the tears that brimmed in her eyes and went to flee down the path, Ken following as quickly as he could manage. It was not until she had reached the honeysuckle archway of Hollyhocks gate that he managed to reach her, gripping her hard at her shoulder. "Have a care, Di," he said, stiffly, "what's this all about?"

A covered lorry went by and sent a merry toot to them both. Ken dropped his hand and brushed it down his tie as Di sent the driver a small wave. She turned to Ken with a hateful look in her eyes. He began to wish he had slammed the door in her face.

"You, you -you swine!" Di fumed. "Swanning in here and trampling on the feelings of my brother and sister. To think I used to find it diverting, the way you left trails of broken hearts about the place-"

"Broken hearts?"

"I'm ashamed of myself for ever finding the humour in such behaviour. You're a louche, a dandy, a fly-by-night! I don't like you, Kenneth Ford!"

"That makes two of us," he said.

"Don't make fun of me."

"Do I look as though I was laughing?"

"You always look as though you were laughing," Di replied. "That's half the problem. I want to be furious with you, I want you to be accountable-"

Ken looked baffled, unable to piece together the little he understood. "God good, woman, to whom? You really must try and make some sense."

She lowered her head and bit her lip -as reassuring as it was to know he seemed safe from further attack Ken rather wished that she wouldn't do that. "Yes, I suppose that's fair. But it only just occurred to me, I wasn't thinking clearly before-" Di fussed with the lapel of her jacket, smoothing it over her breast. Ken didn't try to hide a smile now.

"I did wonder of your whereabouts-" his grey eyes glinting at her.

Honestly, Kenneth Ford! He had more in common with Hazel and Ethel than he would ever have supposed. Presuming he could give her one winning look and she would melt. "Oh no you don't-" she warned him.

"You must admit, Di, you are behaving very curiously."

Di huffed in exasperation. She had gone after O'Ryan with the intention of asking to borrow his bicycle. After a blissful hour under the maple trees that lined the drive to the farmstead -he had begun a correspondence course, she was considering medicine, they both watched with interest over the selection of the new teacher- it was O'Ryan who reminded Di of her original errand. Running after her as she floated down the lane toward the main road, the old iron bike squealing next to him.

"Aren't you forgetting something?"

Di had stopped mid stride and looked at him -was it terror or excitement that she felt at that moment. "Sorry?"

"Didn't you want the use of my bike?" he laughed. Di glanced at the rusted contraption. It had a cross bar. Of course it did! How on earth was she going to ride that? She went to take it from him, recalling how fingertips could be so sensitive to the smallest, briefest of touches. Then trotted the bicycle down the lane knowing he would be watching to see if she meant to ride it or not. Was there ever an idiot so rare as her ridiculous self? No, she saw no occasion to confide this to Kenneth Ford -or anyone else.

"You and Walter are as bad as each other," Di said to him. Yet as the words left her lips so did the fury, instead she felt a profound sadness for them both. "Except that... your leaving ...it will hit him hard, Ken."

"I hadn't thought..."

"No, you don't, do you? You've never had to, everything has always been handed to you. But we've always loved you because they way you can laugh, even at yourself. But this... this isn't funny. This world that we live in now, don't you realise the light is going out of it? Are you just going to squander what remains or are you going to cherish it?" Di demanded, flinging the gate wide and grabbing the bicycle leaning against the fence.

She hitched up her skirts and hopped atop of the bicycle seat, the cross bar snagging her dress so that her white stockinged legs showed all the way to the knees.

"Di Blythe! You can't go about like that!" Ken called after her.

"Watch me!" she cried, and disappeared down the red dirt road.

Ken stood there, unable to move, unsure whether he was half sick of Di Blythe or half in love with her. If only he was. Why couldn't he love her? Why was it Rilla -untouchable, unforgettable Rilla- who had found a way into his heart?

'_The war will be over before your turn comes.'_

How Rilla's words had stung. This war was the chance he needed to prove himself. He wasn't like Walter. Walter had genius, had drive and substance. Ken was merely some pale imitation -he would have been half mad with jealousy if he didn't love his friend with all his heart. No, not all his heart, that love was being crowded out by someone else now.

Sometimes Ken had the feeling he couldn't breathe, and longed to let it out and tell Walter how he felt about her. But after that night, when Walter had woken from some agonising dream, Ken realised he could never speak of it. For all Walter said he wanted Ken for a brother, it was a lie. Ken saw that at least -and more besides. Di had seen it, too. And had seen through him. It really was time to go from this place, he couldn't stand to be peered at for one more minute. But first, if he was any sort of friend, any sort of man, he must make his final goodbyes.

**… … …**

_Title from a song by Wolf Parade -one should listen to Canadian music if one is writing about them I think. The hungry ghosts are from a Buddhist story where, because of past actions, the dead are condemned to hunger and thirst forever. Never able to satisfy themselves because they are filled with holes. _

_quote from Chapter six, Susan, Rilla and Dog Monday make a Resolution, from Rilla of Ingleside  
><em>

_Once again my utter thanks for joining me on this story._**  
><strong>


	16. Light and Shade

**Light and Shade  
><span>**

_In which Kenneth Ford says goodbye_

**_Rainbow Valley, August 19th, 1914_**

The first time Kenneth Ford met Walter Blythe he was lying in his mother's arms in the heart of Rainbow Valley, with his arms about his head and his ankles crossed. Ken had escaped Leslie's clutches and wobbled over inquisitively, peering at this new being with his long lashed, grey eyes, only to find long lashed, grey eyes gazing angelically back at him. Nineteen years later Anne's lap had given way to meadowsweet and foxtail. But the unearthly beauty on Walter's face remained the same, as coolly composed and serene as if he had conjured a sylvan breeze that he alone could feel. For everyone else the sun glared down with a tyrant eye, the bitter breezes of Monday so diminished they didn't dare rustle one leaf.

"It's hot enough to melt a brass monkey," Rilla had told her brother that morning, rather taken with the phrase Mrs Conover had made yesterday, as she bundled a scrawny, naked baby into the girl's quaking arms. The poor brat looked like a monkey too. Quite the opposite of the boy who lay here now, so pale and lean in a thin white shirt and rolled up trousers. His eyes closed, his lips just parted, his black hair fallen back from his head, as though he had been carved from marble. Ken almost walked on tiptoe, telling himself he shouldn't wake him when a week before he would have emptied the flask in his knapsack all over Walter's head. He almost jumped when he heard him speak.

"Stay right where you are."

Ken stopped mid stride, he noticed his shadow on Walter's face and realised he was being used as a parasol. Again he had that impulse, the easy, familiar one, where he would give the rascal a kick or leap on top of him. Instead he stood there, as much a statue at Walter had ever been.

"I can't." Ken voice filled with regret, which Walter ignored.

"Don't be so modest, you're doing a splendid job."

"I mean I can't stay, Walt," Ken said, and lowered himself onto the grass, tucking his hands round his knees.

"Oh _that._ I already know that." Walter blinked in the sunlight and shuffled back into the shade. "Rilla told me what you were up to."

"That wasn't my intention," Ken winced, knowing his intention had been exactly that. "She might have let me tell you, myself-"

"Oh Puss has_ far_ more on her mind than keeping you happy," Walter replied, his eyes in line with the swelling that extended from Ken's ankle bone to his heel; the skin tender and ashen. Strange such a small thing should cost him so much. Ken ran his hand over it self consciously and then sat up a little taller.

"I expect she has," he said, trying for the same sound of nonchalance. "The talk has reached all the way over to deepest, darkest Over-Harbour. Starting a Junior Red Cross, isn't she? Quite the little patriot."

Walter stared at his friend with wide eyed surprise -so he hadn't heard the most astonishing news. He scooped himself up and sat next to Ken, both their backs to the sun.

"You've not seen Rilla, I take it?"

"No, I've been looking for you," Ken answered. Though admittedly he'd taken his time over it.

When Di had sallied forth on that preposterous bicycle on Monday Ken meant to go to Ingleside immediately. But somehow the afternoon dwindled away. On Tuesday Ken had to see to his all his shirts. These should have been attended to the day before by rights, Mim said crossly -with the sort of crossness she reserved for those she was most fond of. Then there had been all those unfinished letters and unanswered invitations to complete before the second post. Now it was Wednesday. And as Wednesdays are for woe -or the children of woe- it seemed the most apt day to say farewell. Telephoning to the Lewison's -Hazel's brother would be joining him as far as Kingsport, and making brief visits at the Eben Reeses and the Leo Wests. Only after he had munched through two chicken salads, three slices of cake and slurped through four cups of tea did he pass through the hedges of Hollyhocks and walk the length of the sandbar. He felt certain Walter would be there. But he was not, nor his littlest sister, or that mangy Dog Monday, who could still not be coaxed from the Glen station platform.

Filling a flask with water from the pump and plucking the last of the Hollyhocks apricots -warm, velvet and likely to squash- Ken set off again, this time to Rainbow Valley. Neither leaf nor bell stirred as he entered. The sacred green desiccating into straw coloured spikes. Even the stream refused to babble, but glazed the pebbles beneath it like a sheen of sweat. Ken removed his shoes and a length of gauze then plunged his feet into the water, splashing it over his ankle which had throbbed for the last half hour. As he passed through the trees by the stream and into the glade the world fell silent. He felt as if he trespassed in a tomb. But Walter Blythe was very much alive, as full of spirit and humour as he had ever been. Strange to say it was Ken who had changed. And he was not the only one. Walter eyed him now with unconcealed glee, curious to see the effect the next piece of news would have on Mr Ford.

"Rilla's only gone and adopted a baby-"

"Pull the other one, Walter-" Ken scoffed, though it was relief rather than disbelief that sounded in his voice. He had expected to hear that some smooth cheeked youth had come courting the youngest Miss Blythe, not be told ridiculous nonsense like this. Rilla would no more countenance the bringing up of a baby than he would! "Your creative genius has gone stale if you think I would fall for so obvious a lie as that."

"Let the bells fall silent evermore and the tree lovers never touch again."

Ken glanced up to those beloved green guardians and then back to a pair of mischievous grey eyes. "A baby?"

Walter nudged his friend's shoulder, feeling far more pleasure than he should have in Ken's handsome face gone as pale and stricken as his poor foot. He turned his laughter into a discreet clearing of his throat and began to relay the tale that was 'the War Orphan in the Soup Tureen'. Ken gave every impression he was listening, yet at the end, when the story climaxed with the good doctor declaring Rilla must decide whether she alone would care for the child -a solemn yet daunted Rilla answering, 'yeth'- he could only say again, "A _baby?_"

One of those recently finished letters felt conspicuous in Ken's pocket. His few pathetic lines costing him much ink and even more panic -how impossible it had been to commit his feelings to paper when he actually meant them. The light, the moon, the path, she would construe his true meaning and realise their stroll along the sand had meant the world to him. But now... _a baby! _Obviously romance had never been on Rilla's mind. She would never think of adopting a baby if she were in love with him; subscribing wholly to Mr Shakespeare on this, that while love was of man's life a thing apart it was a woman's whole existence. He did not know how close he came to the truth that night under the chestnut tree, when he said he knew nothing of women.

Her brother knew something, however. Walter had passed by her bedroom on the foundling's first night at Ingleside. As he listened to Rilla pace the floor in the small hours humming the tune to the Hesitation, he thought even Jem -undaunted, golden Jem- could not have shown a courage equal to their little Spider. Ken, on the other hand, was looking quite the opposite. His hand twisting nervously at the corner of an envelope stuffed into his trousers.

"Chin up, lover-boy, you haven't got a ring in that pocket have you?" Walter reached up and scruffed Ken's hair. It had not been slicked back today and felt warm and glossy under his hand, as it did when they were boys.

They were boys still. Too young to lose their lives to the rifles and bayonets that were at this moment being fixed together for the umpteenth time by the now expert hands of Privates Blythe and Meredith. The only battles to be had in the Valley were the ones they read out of books or that ended in nothing more than a bloody nose. Ken gave into boyish impulse now and pushed Walter into the ground, snatching his panama hat and popping it onto his head.

"Give me your beautifully cut waistcoat, then I can be you and you can be me," Walter said, as he lay back in the buttercups. "Of course, I'll need your boater too. Can't be Ken Ford without that!"

"Over by the stream," Ken muttered, laying back in the grass and pushing the hat over his eyes. "Grab my knapsack while you're at it, I'm dying of thirst," and was half surprised to see Walter jump and do his bidding.

Ken wriggled out of his natty waistcoat and loosened another button at his neck, aware of how the sun seemed to aim straight for the pale white skin under his collar with the pitiless intention of turning it crimson.

"How do I look?" Walter called out to him, strutting through the meadow and tipping his hat like a dandy, singing, _"I'm Gilbert the filbert, the knut with a k. The pride of Piccadilly, the blasé roue!"_

The Valley resounded with rowdy laughter as Ken watched the poet of P.E.I. belting out a Vaudeville tune. How on earth had Walter come to hear that? But of course it would be Rilla's doing, he asked and answered himself in the same moment. A brilliant girl was Rilla Blythe!

"Here we are, Ken with a k!" Walter announced, lying down next to Ken and offering him the last of the apricots. He adjusted the boater over his eyes but it didn't sit as comfortably as his own. "You can have this thing back," he said, spinning it round his finger.

"Thought you wanted to be me," Ken said, dozily.

Walter had to admit it was far more satisfying to lie next to Ken Ford than to actually _be_ the fellow. "I thought better of it. I seem to recall some advice on the matter. Hmm, how did it go?" and he cleared his throat so that Ken might know another performance was about to begin. "To thine own self be true," he pronounced, in earnest, clipped tones, "and it must follow, as the night follows day, thou canst not then be false to any man -or something to that effect," he chuckled.

Ken rolled up onto his elbow and tilted back Walter's hat, his grey eyes filled with glad surprise to find their thoughts in such harmony. "I was just thinking of all the plays we used to put on here," he grinned at him. "Remember our Midsummer Night's Dream?"

It never progressed much past the four lovers arguing, usually because in reality the four lovers -well, _would be_ lovers- could not stop arguing. Di's Titania and Ken's Oberon rolling their eyes as they loafed about on the mossy rocks waiting to say their lines. Carl had been Bottom and spent most of his time trying to re-create the most accurate papier mache donkey head. Shirley agreed to play Theseus, but only because he knew nobody cared about him and therefore never noticed if he turned up to practice or not. Walter had been Puck, of course, with Persis a breast beating Hyppolita. Little Rilla was content to skip around them all with her baby shawl for fairy wings leaping over Una, who cradled a beaten up copy of Abridged Shakespeare for Children and worked as prompt.

"What about our grand romantic tragedy? You can't have forgotten that, _Romeo,_" Walter joked. He was about to laugh again, recalling how serious they had all been about that production, when a chill went through him.

"No I haven't, _Juliet," _Ken retorted, "but we didn't put that on in the Valley, that was at Ravenscroft. When you and Jem came to stay with your Mother during the '09 blizzard. It snowed up past my bedroom window."

It had been a full house. Two school chums of Persis and two associates of Owen's were trapped with them, one of them very much what Jem called a fop. That fop took a particular liking to Walter Blythe, and when Persis had declared she would give up the part of Juliet if the boys wouldn't be more sensible, suggested the beautiful black haired boy take the part instead. That was all Persis Ford needed to return to the stage. Wasn't it enough that men refused to give women the vote, now they were stealing their leading roles!

Both boys shivered despite the heat. Walter lost in an unwanted memory of that blonde eyebrowed man, the one who took a little too much interest in the amateur theatricals of the Blythe and Ford children. He had followed Walter on his way to the kitchen and pinned him to the one of the dark panelled walls of Ken's labyrinthine house, quoting Byron's 'The Cornelian' through a sweet sour breath of rum. Ken lay staring at his friend, lost in his own thoughts. Remembering the moment before his sister had marched into the great room to protest the rights of women, just as Walter had finished act three, scene five. Standing upon a chair, his sorrowful grey eyes looking into Ken's, declaring-

"Methinks I see thee now, thou art so low, as one dead at the bottom of a tomb."_  
><em>

Those were the lines that had sung through Ken's body ever since he'd found Walter here this afternoon. The notion was clearly nonsensical, Walter had suffered his brush with the Reaper and he had conquered it. Surely, it was only the war that made him feel this way -the light was going out, just as Di had said. Strange that it had never shone more fiercely. Boring into Ken so that he felt almost fevered, yet unable to stop that cold feeling creeping inside. He flopped onto his back again and peered up at a blue sky fringed in foliage like some enormous eye.

"I say, Walt?"

"Mmm," he replied, still occupied with thoughts about what had happened in that corridor.

"What was it like? When you thought you were... not long for this world?"

"When I almost died, you mean?" Walter asked him, his words calm and even, as though he had been expecting this question for some time. "I won't lie to you, there were times I really believed that I might cease to be, before my pen had gleaned my teeming brain." His voice took on a dreamy sound as he quoted one of those poor tubercular poets who died before their time. He looked at Ken staring at the blue above; to think beyond that veil of daylight were the mysterious, untouchable beauties of night. "To be given a second chance at life only to end up broken by war... I couldn't do it, Ken. Nor could I do it to someone else... In that moment -when I ensured some other man should die I know I should die myself."

"I feel shall die if I don't go."

"You may die if you do."

"We are all going to die, Walter," Ken said, with the ease of one who has never been touched by death. "But first I would like to live. To know, as you do, that my living made some sort of difference."

"And you think that will happen on a battlefield?" Walter did not even try to disguise the contempt in his voice.

"Well it won't happen in some dusty lecture theatre, or in a ballroom, or a game. And I sure as hell won't find it in anything I try to write-"

"What about love?" Walter asked him, looking where Ken looked.

"I thought we had decided we had sworn off women?" Ken groaned. "No more waltzes and dances and silly silver slippers-"

"I never said women," Walter said quietly, a crimson stain blotting his face that had nothing to do with the sun. "I said love."

There would have to be champagne in that flask before they dared talk about that. Yet Ken found the courage to do more than that, and brought his hand to his friend's face and turned it to his own.

"I know I said I knew nothing about that. But you should know, I bally well hope you do... that I love you, Walt. You are my better angel, my better self. I am only Owen Ford's son. But _you_ are Walter Blythe. If I can't be you," his grey eyes smiling into Walter's, "it's enough for me to know you."_  
><em>

Enough for Ken but not enough for Walter. He had never felt like this when Faith Meredith asked so carefully for his friendship; he had removed Faith's hand from his own as though removing a glove that no longer fit. But Ken's touch was like the a light in the dark. In that brief moment Walter suddenly felt less afraid. His hand went to his cheek, he knew he was blushing -and that he had made a fool of himself. Still, 'the poet of P.E.I.' was used to other people looking at him askance. He ran his hands over his hair and cradled his head, appearing so serene and composed as if the last minute had never happened, only saying,

"Then give me back my hat."

Ken pulled himself up. The heat, the lethargy, the sentimental talk, he'd had enough. "Come and get it!" he challenged, and darted off with a hobbling gait toward the stream.

Walter exhaled deeply. But there was a smile there too. He next caught sight of Ken wading through the shallow waters of the stream, throwing his clothes into the reeds and heading to the swimming hole. Walter scrambled up the bank and followed him through the trees, discovering Ken up to his waist in water wearing nothing but his cream panama hat. There were other boys there too. Carl, Shirley and Gilbert O'Ryan had just had their fishing ruined by that city boy, Ken Ford. And were yanking off their boots and and flicking their braces off their shoulders, about to leap on top of the ignoramus and take their revenge.

Walter lay down, holding his face in his hands, watching the boys splashing about in the water -and ruining his hat. It was not long before they turned their attention to him, gathering great waves of water in their brown, wet arms and soaking Walter to the skin. He stood up and whipped off his sodden shirt and lay it one the dry grass, the white cotton bubbling over long, spiky fronds. But he did not join them. Walter had forsaken the water hole years ago, preferring to sit with a journal or a book on his lap, a pencil or a timothy stem in his mouth.

He pulled out the pencil stub that lived in his pocket and felt about for some paper, before remembering he'd seen an envelope in Ken's pocket. The crumpled rectangle had not yet been sealed though Walter would never dream of reading its contents. He saw Rilla's name -the R blooming wildly with running ink- and that was enough.

Leaning the paper upon his knees he let himself become lost in the scene. The feel of the sun on his back, the taste of the pencil in his mouth, the sound of the boys in the water; today was a blessed day. Walter let all that heat and light go into him, all that gladness and feeling, as if storing it for darker days to come.

When Ken Ford saw Walter Blythe for the last time he was sleeping in the long grass with his head in his hands and his ankles crossed. His chest white and bare, so lean he might have been carved from marble, a small envelope tucked by his hip bone that jutted above the waist of his rolled up trousers. Ken grasped at it with a flush of embarrassment and then followed Shirley back to Ingleside to make his farewells.

Rilla was not there, gone with her baby to sew clothes for her little one at the Manse. He sat on the swing seat on the veranda -with cold tea and warm chicken salad- remembering the night he had sat by Rilla's side in the moon-white sands. How she looked at him in her pale green gown with tiny roses like kisses all around it, and told him she had worked so hard on it because that's what people did at Ingleside -they had grand passions. Well, Rilla Blythe had found hers, it seemed, and he must find his. He must follow the Piper now.

That evening in the spare room at Hollyhocks Ken stared out at the Island moon one last time and listened to the waves break upon the shore. He pulled out that idiotic letter, thinking of his good angel and imagining, not for the first time, what he might write if he were Walter Blythe.

Then miraculously the words were there, scribbled in looping grey pencil on the back of the envelope.

What shall I call you? A fountain in a waste,

A well of water in a country dry

Or anything that's honest and good, an eye

That makes the whole world bright._  
><em>

_**... ... ...** _

_Shakespeare quotes from Midsummer Night's Dream, Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet, respectively._

_'Gilbert the Filbert' 1914; by Wimperis and Finck (by the way a 'knut' is a cad or a flirt or a dandy -Di Blythe could probably add to that list!)_

_Fragment from 'When I have fears that I may cease to be' by my dearest John Keats, 1795-1821_

_Last quote is a fragment from 'The Confirmation' by the magnificent Edwin Muir, 1887-1959_


	17. The Trouble with the Fords

_Thank you for all your lovely reviews for the last chapter, it really is getting to be sad all this leaving, especially knowing what they are all leaving for. Here's a bit of fizz bang to start the next part of the story._

** The Trouble with the Fords**

_In which we are introduced to the other women in Ken Ford's life  
><em>

_**The King Edward Hotel Ballroom, King St, Toronto; October 8th 1914 ~some time before midnight**  
><em>

"So, who is she then?"

Ken looked up to see the most beautiful girl in the room inches from his face. Her sapphire eyes and her white blonde hair, not for nothing she was known as the Persian kitten. Looking at this moment like one who had very definitely got the cream.

"Oh, do go away, Persis," Ken muttered.

God help him he was bored. These charity functions, for all people pretended to be doing good works, wasn't it merely another excuse to gossip and matchmake? It was like being back on the Island but without the view, without any place of beauty, or anywhere to be alone. Wherever one went someone was sizing you up. Even his sister was no longer immune. Take away that Japanese silk draping about her expensively -until it reached her calves where the fabric seemed to have run short- and she could have sat on the porch of any cottage in the Glen and held her own quite comfortably.

"Mrs Bart Thorpe-Davis has been giving you the glad eye all evening," Persis continued, dragging over the bentwood chair that had recently held the girl who had declined many a dance in the hope that Ken Ford might give her a twirl. And was currently in the arms of the very thug who had broken Ken's foot.

"Mrs Bart Thorpe-Davis is married, sister dear -the clue's in the name."

As if that made a jot of difference! All the boys lined up to be deflowered by Dorothy 'Dimples' Thorpe-Davis. She was easily thirty and said to do the most amazing things with her feet. Ken would have had her up on the dance floor in a minute -sore ankle or no sore ankle- after even _one_ of her kohl-eyed, come hither stares. But Dimples had been sending carefully composed looks at Owen Ford's table all night and suddenly Ken was oblivious. Persis Ford meant to discover why. She pulled a dish closer and tried to flick her cigarette, this contraption was deucedly hard to manage, but she would rise to the challenge. Besides, leaving long ends of ash hanging off the ebony cigarette holder rather spoiled the look of elegance she was aiming for.

"You look ridiculous with that stick hanging out of your mouth," Ken sniffed.

"Well, what's good for the goose..." Persis replied, plucking out the wobbly cigarette and stubbing it out as a bad job, before helping herself to another from Ken's silver case.

"If the old man sees you-"

"Father! He left as soon as the band started up. You know he hates this _modern_ music." She crossed one lithe leg over the other, bouncing her foot in time to the Maple Leaf Rag whilst expertly snapping her match.

The resinous smell of tobacco reminded Ken of his mother's patchouli scent as she dropped a kiss upon his head. Telling him to mind his foot before strolling away with Owen to the hat check counter. That could only have been an hour ago, how had he come to forget that? Especially as, now he came to think of it, he was annoyed by their disappearing act.

"How are we meant to get back to the Croft?" he said.

"Laws, Island boy, ain't you changed!" Persis giggled. "There's such a thing as taxi cabs, you know. Not that I expected you'd want one. I rather imagined you breaking the other foot trying to sneak out of Mrs Bart Thorpe-Davis' boudoir."

"Do drop it, sister. All this coarse behaviour really doesn't suit you."

"Well, all this mooning about like a love-sick pup doesn't suit you. So spill the beans, who is she? You're not cut up about Daff getting engaged are you?"

"Persis, Mother sent me to the Wests to get away from Daphne Standish. Any man who would willingly summer at Over-Harbour is hardly going mourn that loss," Ken said, though his smirk became more of a frown as he spoke. Jokes about those quaint Island folk weren't as funny as they used to be. These summering families with their patronising airs, Ken wondered if the joke weren't more on them. As if his sister read his thoughts she blurted out-

"Yikes, don't tell me it's Hazel Lewison?"

Ken shuffled his chair away and began to roll a cigarette. There were already seven others lined up like little soldiers in his case, but he felt fidgety under his sister's scrutiny. And since the drink wasn't agreeing with him he might as well smoke himself into oblivion.

"Sorry to disappoint but there are no beans to spill. I'm just done in, this is the third party we've been to this week."

"How extremely unpatriotic of you, Kenneth Ford. You can't expect us to just roll up our chiffon gowns and start knitting socks and basting sheets. Our lot need a way to chip in with the war effort, too. This table cost Tancred Publishers $1000, you know. The least you can do is look as though you enjoyed yourself, or make sure someone else does. Look at poor Gladys Tancred -so trussed up, she hasn't touched her parfait! Goodness-" Persis peered across the large round table, "I think her face is going purple-"

"Persis, have you been drinking?"

"Would _I _do that?" she winked, and then turned to decline a dance from Edward Randwick II, "Sorry Teddy darling, rallying the troops right now. Brother's out of sorts."

"What say, Ford," Teddy drawled, his slim white fingers lingering too long on Persis' bare shoulders. "You for the off, then? Uncle Geoffrey has wrangled me a tasty position at The Hill. Secretary to the under commissioner for the under commissioner... or something like that. Set off for the capital next week. What do you say, Kitten, how about giving a poor soldier a good send off?" He plucked the cigarette out of her scarlet lips and gave it a good long drag. Persis found herself hoping the hot embers burning toward his mouth would wilt his waxy moustache.

"Oh toodle off, Teddy. Go chat up Gladys!"

He turned on his heel and took her cigarette with him, Persis went to grab another when Ken snapped the case shut.

"You can go toodle off to Gladys as well. I just remembered I'm not talking to you."

"You're not _still_ upset about that!"

"You nearly _killed_ me."

"I wonder at you wanting to be a soldier so badly if you're so worried about dying."

"I would at least like the option of sacrificing my life to something besides your silly manifestos. Really, Persis. You think you're all for the rights of the working man, but do you realise you could have cost Barfoot his job-"

"His name is Terrence-"

"His name could be Herbert, First Earl Kitchener. You had no right ordering him into the backseat."

"I never _ordered_ him." Ken gave his sister a disbelieving stare, under which Persis rightfully wilted. It possibly hadn't been the best idea to tell their driver she intended to collect Ken from Union Station, herself. But if the ride had been a little hairy it was only because she never had enough time behind the wheel. "I only wanted to drive _him_ around for a change. Father _never_ lets me drive. You can drive. Just because you're a boy!"

"It's not because I'm _male_, it's because you're _nineteen_. Good God, you think you're so high and mighty. Do you know Barfoot-"

"Terrence."

"Yes, alright, Terrence," Ken huffed. "Do you know Terrence has five orphaned grandchildren to support? If you happened to crash the Bentley do you think any family in their right mind would ever hire him as their chauffeur -that is if he wasn't mangled first."

"We got home alright, didn't we?"

"Do you mean after we almost took down the cyclist or when we nearly ran into the lorry?"

"Well _you_ were trying to take the wheel!"

"Well _you_ were busy philosophising with Barfoot about the decline in rights of the migrant worker."

Persis fumed and for good measure grabbed the newly rolled cigarette out of her brother's fingers. She drew back on it hard and shot smoke across the table, watching it settle in the grubby champagne flutes and nestle into the scattered dishes. What a frightful waste it was. If she wasn't so infuriated by her brother's_ always_ being right she would have agreed with him about these horrid, dull parties. For the price of that bottle of Canard Duchene some poor soul could have eaten for a month.

"Do you know Tancred Publishers pay the Irish two dollars less than other workers?"

"No use telling me. If you must proselytise go tell Gladys."

Persis pouted. While it was a topic close to her heart Father would never let her out of the house again if she said such a thing to the CEO's daughter. And though these parties were a drudge, as Ken said, she _was_ only nineteen. Having a gay old time was practically expected of her.

"Do stop telling me to chat up, Gladys. She's hardly my type," Persis joked, without the slightest care of being overheard. She leaned over her chair-back and gazed at the dancers on the floor. "Beattie Davenport on the other hand... Now she's ravishing." Ken peered into the crowd on the dance floor, staring for such a long time Persis thought perhaps she had misdiagnosed his love-sickness after all.

"She's wearing one of yours," Ken said. "Doubt you'd think she looked half so well, otherwise."

"True enough. But it does look divine on her," said Persis, with more than a hint of pride. "It's a variation on that one I sent Nan Blythe for her birthday. I suppose she hated it, Ken -_Ken?_ That jade silk dress, did you ever see Nan wear it?"

"Yes-" Ken replied, absently. He was not thinking of Nan in all that jade, but someone else. Someone who had made a big impression on Kenneth Ford -just not quite the impression she was aiming for. "Funny kid," he added softly. There was a dreamy sound to his voice and like the cat she was Persis pounced on it.

"What, Nan Blythe! It's not Nan Blythe, is it, Ken? We're practically related," Persis gushed. It would be like marrying a cousin, the Blythes were as much kin to her as any West... Though if Nan was going to show such good taste and actually _wear_ the dress. "I never expected her to even try it on. She's always struck me as such a pink and frilly thing. Gorgeous, of course, and an utter dear, but so ...so... _Victorian!_" That last word said with all the contempt of a curse word.

"One wonders why you sent it to her in the first place if you thought she'd hate it."

One didn't wonder at all but it was better talking about this than the other.

"Because I knew she'd pass it on to Di, obviously! Now _Di_ has style. A little countrified but for an Island girl quite the avant garde."

Ken began digging away at the remains of his parfait, the strawberries and custard bleeding together like an Island sunrise. He supposed Persis meant him to persist with this conversation and divine exactly what her logic had been in giving each twin the present the other would have wanted -Di received a pair of shoes with the highest of heels. But right now chatting up Gladys Tancred seemed the easier option.

"I say, Glad, you eating that? Mine's all melted," Ken asked her from across the table. Miss Tancred took a look at her oozy, glossy dessert, another at the oozy, glossy Ken Ford, burst into tears and fled the table.

"You do have a way, don't you brother. Look! Dimples Thorpe-Davis is looking over at you _again."_

"And Alfie Randwick is looking to succeed where his big brother failed," Ken replied, eyeing another waxy moustached type striding toward their table.

"Ugh, that brute. Take me out for some air, would you?" Persis demanded, grabbing the fur stole she had draped on the back of Ken's chair and laying it about her neck. She stood up and looked at her brother with a familiar scorn. "I'd try and breathe all by myself but apparently I'm too feeble minded to go outside without a man to hold my hand. And stop rolling your eyes at me every time I open my mouth. The wind will change and you'll have nothing but your cleverness to keep you in clover, and _then_ where will you be?"

**… … …**

About to complete a double degree in mathematics and philosophy was where Ken Ford's cleverness had got him. Logic appeared to be his strong suit. So what was wrong with him? He wasn't making any sense at all.

This writing to Rilla for example. It had begun with nothing more than a note. The new term had been about to start and knowing she be would be feeling the loss of her brothers and sisters, Walter especially, he jotted off a few lines. Not that he particularly cared if the recipient ever wrote back, she was a _mother_ after all. Yet the girl had replied to him unfalteringly, the same little notes of lightness and fun. He even came to regret their brevity whilst other, no doubt meatier, letters piled up in the hallway unread. He never thought of them now except to shuffle through their scented envelopes looking to see if he had missed one of Rilla's. Each time he saw the P.E.I postmark he felt electric. So it was this morning on the last day of the year, he grasped the envelope from his mother's hand as though it were a danger to her. It actually seemed to buzz in his hands.

Leslie Ford was shrewd enough to allow her son enough time to take in the chief contents of the letter before asking any questions. Watching him as he savoured Rilla's thank you for the book he'd sent her for Christmas -he had even signed the card himself.

_I've heard such wondrous things of Robert Frost! Walter and I devoured it. Which makes me doubly happy as you know how hard it is to cheer him at the moment..._

"B.M. Blythe? Who in the world is _B.M._ Blythe?" his mother asked him, glancing at the neatly addressed envelope.

"Well, it's Rilla's name, isn't it?" Ken said, hoping to sound as though he wasn't quite sure, "Bertha Marilla -or something like that..." and held the page a little higher.

"You'll go cross eyed reading like that," Leslie said, nibbling a corner of toast and then murmuring to Sadie about more tea. She observed the girl trot out of the room before she continued. "Put the letter down, my love. I can see very well that you're blushing."

"_Mother-"_

"What?" Leslie replied, "I think it becomes you. I haven't seen you blush over a girl since... well since '07."

When the Fords took that sabbatical in Japan and young Ken Ford took a liking to the Tanaka's daughter. Leslie was wearing the kimono they gave her now. The satin still as sumptuous, the cherry blossoms still looking as if they might yet shear away -like the last remnants of her son's boyhood.

"I'm not blushing," he grumbled, "I'm baking under all this glass."

"_Baking?_ Then it must be serious. When I passed the barometer in the hall I swear the temperature read 30. I was about to ask Dupleix to bring some more wood for the fire," and she smiled indulgently as her son huffed with that mysterious discontent that seemed to dwell in him these days.

Since Ken had left for Hollyhocks Ravenscroft had been under attack. As well as the great room being refurnished almost the entire back wall of the breakfast room had been removed and replaced with floor to ceiling glazing. For some reason Ken could not account for he had taken the changes to heart. Harrumphing over it continually _and_ all the William Morris wallpaper that had been hung wherever there wasn't a panelled wall -you couldn't look for rosebuds and vines. Persis was right about one thing at least, he _was_ acting like cantankerous old bore. And him a card carrying modern. No, he wasn't making any sense at all.

"Your father had a yearning to bring the outdoors in," Leslie continued. "He's so low about the state of the world at the moment. Is it asking too much to have reminders of how beautiful it can be?"

Ken gazed out to the bleak view of a December garden, its pruned back roses and skeletal trees, all the green gone to black. Hardly a vista one might take pleasure in, unless you were Walter Blythe, of course. He could probably call forth one thousand words to bring this world to life -in perfect dactylic pentameter. He _must_ finish his letter to him. Reading between the lines of Rilla's neat little hand it was clear that her brother had been in much need of the Christmas break, if only to get away from all the accusing looks at Redmond.

Ken knew the feeling well. Persis had suggested he take his cane around with him again so that people might know why he hadn't enlisted. How Ken had seethed. He was no shirker, but he was no dissembler either. Though he knew his sister meant to be kind he also knew that he was very close to granting that brat equal rights and popping her smartly on the nose. Instead he took his anger out on the poor cane, snapping it in two and tossing it on the bonfire. Ken leaned forward, and in quiet concession to his mother poked at the smouldering logs in the grate trying to draw out the flames, and they hissed at him mockingly.

"Not so hot as all that, then," she commented. "Now tell me, what news from young Bertha?"

"Who?"

"You know who I mean. How long have you been writing each other?" Leslie had long given up trying to keep tabs on all the young things who corresponded with her son, in much the way Mim West had. "I understand she's caring for a war orphan. I confess I took her for a pampered little thing. But to bring up a child, even with all the comforts of Ingleside, well I judged her wrongly. It's no mean thing to devote yourself to the care of another with no way of knowing how long you must do it. I gave into much bitterness myself when the task was given to me."

Ken gazed over at his mother fondly. Though others discerned a certain coolness about Leslie -she certainly had the reputation of not suffering fools- she was all he had wanted a mother to be. There was none of the histrionics, or worse, flirtatiousness, that afflicted some Toronto matrons. She was a mountain to her son, and if that meant she sometimes stood aloof, he also knew her to be indomitable.

"An angel could not have cared for George Moore with more patience and selflessness."

Leslie tucked her hair behind her ear, wearing the same shy smile as her younger, red girdled self. "You have only your father's word for that."

"Mother! You're not suggesting the great Canadian novelist is not true to his word?"

"Rascal! You know very well what I mean." Leslie sat back in her chair and ran her hand along the edge of the table, the smile fleeing from her lips as quickly as it came. "Actually, as we speak of your father I might as well broach the subject-" she said carefully, her fingers tracing over Battenburg lace, "about his suggestion that you work as a correspondent. Owen still has strong connections with the paper and his old colleagues will be at the party tonight. This might be a more... a more _meaningful_ way to contribute to the war." She looked up tentatively to see Ken glaring at her.

"So you're calling it a war now?" he said, sharply. "When I declared my intention to enlist once the doctors had given me the all clear I recall you and Father insisting this was to be a short-lived conflict, and that Jem and Jerry would be home for Christmas."

"Owen trusted to hope and I stand by him in this. Hope was his most beloved gift to me -aside from you and Persis, of course," Leslie added, touching Ken's arm gently, "and I cling to it still. But with the withdrawal at Lodz and the losses at Champagne... there can be no easy end to this now. The Blythes endured a very dark Christmas, Jem's regiment is being deployed from Salisbury Plain in just over a month. And while I love that prince of Four Winds like I love no other child of Anne, _you_ a different matter entirely."

"You mean _I_ come from a wealthy family," Ken said, stabbing his crumpet with more viciousness than a butter knife was used to. His mother only laughed, the sort of deep, resonant laugh that made her long, loose hair shake in golden waves across her shoulders.

"Laws yes, both the Wests and the Fords hark back to _long_ lines of earls!" Leslie hooted, sweeping strands out of her glinting blue eyes. She went to take a sip of tea and saw that her cup and the pot were still empty. "You, dear boy, are Island through and through, and that is something all the money in the world cannot buy you. I don't know though..." she continued, more seriously now. A conversation with his mother was like a brisk, choppy day, the sunshine and cloud ever in battle. "I _had_ hoped that summering with Martin and Mim might have brought you down to earth," -with a good hard thud, she thought but did not say. "Yet it's as though only half of you came back. It's not... it's not anything to do with that, is it?" Leslie said, motioning to the page in Ken's hand.

He folded the letter and stuffed it back in the envelope. "Rilla Blythe?" His face felt hot again but he decided to brazen out, his mother would only tell him how well he looked anyway. "She's a chum. As are all the Blythes, you know that."

This time Leslie Ford eyed him skeptically and Ken realised that he would have to reveal some smaller truths. "As it happens she's a concerned about Walter. Someone sent him a white feather-"

"_Beasts!_" Leslie went pale thinking of how such a spiteful action would have wounded the boy. And he was not the only one in their acquaintance to have been so insulted. "You see why this upsets us? If we are not for this war it does not follow we are for the Kaiser. But once you take a set against your enemies it's _never_ long before you take a set against your own. Poor Walter..."

"Mother, please don't mention this to Anne. I know you two talk of everything, but Walter would feel it as a betrayal if he knew I had said anything-"

"No, no. It is not for me- in fact I can say it would hurt Anne more if she suspected Walter could not tell her himself. Dear lad. Has he heard back from Tancred about those new poems he submitted?"

Walter had in fact. But despite good sales of his first little book the season of the idle poet was over. Tales from the trenches were what everyone wanted now. Ken had heard his father bellow down the line at his publishers over similar demands. Owen Ford spent more and more time holed up in his den these days. Ken only ever used his mother's study now.

Leslie had been working on a biography of Hildegarde of Bingen ever since Ken could talk, spending countless afternoons sitting on her knee as she tried to keep the ink pot from his grasp and deliberated over the next sentence. Mother and son like a modern day reflection of the portrait that hung above them, of Sassoferrato's Madonna and Child. It was only a copy of the great renaissance work, and the idea of his mother not having the real thing had been a source of both incomprehension and iron resolve to little Ken. How many times had he vowed that when he was rich he would buy her the _real_ painting. Hadn't Jem Blythe been equally indignant about a little string of pearls he had bought his mother, were they really so dissimilar?

"Answer me this first. Why do you agree with Jem's enlisting yet you don't feel the same for me?"

_Why?_ Ken would have to raise his own child before he could ever understand how a mother felt on this matter. Young Rilla would probably have more insight into Leslie's heart than her own son at this moment. It would be fruitless to explain her feelings. The boy would only ascribe them to sentimentality, even if down to the last strand of her thick gold hair there was not an inch of the sentimental about Leslie Ford.

"Because we thought he would be home by Christmas, because he has Jerry Meredith at his side, because-"

"Because his father supported his decision."

"It was your strutting about the football field that excluded you from enlisting, not your father_._"

"That is so, of course. But his every word implies his position upon the matter. I am determined to see battle and he would take the rifle out of my hand and give me a- a- typewriter!"

"Is that so very bad?"

"It isn't _me!_" Ken declared, thinking, not for the first time, that Walter Blythe was the son they really wanted.

This godawful world he inhabited where rich idiots like Teddy Randwick were found cosy positions to keep them safe, while poets and artists were already filling graves in France. It made Ken more determined than ever to do his part. He slammed his hand down upon the table and Sadie, who was making her second attempt to enter with the tea things, crept back out of the room.

Leslie observed him with a new fascination. While there was much of the boy still about him, this resolve was surely the beginnings of the man. She became aware of a sudden shift in her love for him from a doting, careless feeling into something more respectful and admiring.

"Don't ask me to be something I'm not," Ken said, firmly. Leslie pulled his hand toward hers and grasped it tight.

"I would rather die than condemn a child of mine to a life like that. But it is not enough to say what you are not anymore, Kenneth. When you talk to your father, if you are to convince him, then you must be very clear about who you are."

**… … …**


	18. Cruel Nature

_With love and gratitude to L.M.M. -and my amazing reviewers :o)_

**_Cruel Nature_**

_In which Rilla feels lost; and Ken finds something to hold onto  
><em>

_**Ingleside, March, 1915  
><strong>_

Rilla Blythe looked up through her window and peered at the moon. The sharp little crescent looked like a finger nail scratching down the sky. She glared at it, and then at the page in her hand, before placing it with the others in an old decoupaged box. Anne had given it to her upon noticing that Leslie Ford's son was writing with unusual frequency these days, and quietly wondered if the old box that once held a certain medical student's letters might be of some use. Rilla smoothed her hands over it, upon cut-outs of faded roses and cherubs, feeling sure that Mother's love letters must have contained something more than periodic tables and anatomy lessons -surely Father would have been more romantic than that! So it was that Rilla felt Ken Ford's letters didn't quite belong in this sacred box. Every week would she open a letter from Toronto with delicious anticipation only to feel the same disappointment.

Though his previous mentions of parties and galas made her feel every bit the country school girl they were at least a thrilling read. But lately there had been no lines of nonsense in his letters, no teasing, and -aside from all those x's- almost nothing to make her blush. He only ever wrote about the war now; of Captain Toogood and Sergeant Thwaites, and Thumper, Sandy and Murcho; of styles of caps -felt or canvas?- and worse! All sorts of lingo and abbreviations he just expected her to _know _as though she was a class mate in his code breaking class. He was no different to her old school chums. It didn't seem to matter where you came from anymore. If you were a boy there was only one place for your life to go and one way for it to end. It was no more interesting than watching an icicle melt. But if you were a girl, well, suddenly everything opened, like those first vivid crocus heads nudging their way through the frosted lawns of Ingleside.

The Rilla Blythe of that blowsy summer, wishing away her careless days as she rocked on the hammock and invented things to be cross about was no more. Too many cares weighed upon her young self. Would the Junior Reds make their target of fifty new pairs of socks by the end of March? Could she lure Dulcie Douglas back to help with the bake sale? The girl swore to defect to the Lowbridge Red Cross after her mother and Mary-Rose's disagreed over how much sugar could be left out of a sweet pie crust and it still be considered a patee sucree. Sugar was going short now, and so were most other things -Susan had talked about turning over the 'tennis court' to plant out crops! And would baby Jims ever cut that tiresome tooth? Rilla was having to change his bib four times a day and Morgan's patented cure for chapped, hot cheeks didn't seem to make the least bit of difference.

She was almost thankful for these small worries, because they did a good job of distracting her from bigger ones. Jem was currently up to his knees in filthy water in a bombed out cellar in Neuve Chapelle. Mother hardly laughed anymore -and worse Father seemed to have lost the trick of knowing how to make her laugh. Susan was always poring over maps or peering down the casualty lists in the 'Enterprise'. And her beloved Miss Oliver was a wraith of wandering fears now that Mr Grant had enlisted, too.

Then there was Walter, so lost and hateful. Not to her, he was her best friend in the world. But hateful of the war. Hateful to himself. And when that teasing moon would rise, and Jims was snuggled up tight, and Rilla attempted to write something that might cheer her brother, she would look through her decoupaged box aching for inspiration. But all Ken's talk of having some grand ambition for himself, of following a bright, new path, only lead to the same one every other boy was going down. To an endless line of trenches cut into the earth. All Rilla could do was wait to see if he might emerge from the other side.

For all her waiting the world was also turning and at last came an afternoon that did not mock at spring but serenaded it. Where the sun poured its brightest light onto Ingleside and the women long within it could venture out -to the veranda at least. As they drank in those warm, pale rays, Rilla tucked her latest letter from Toronto in her apron, and after muddling out the ankle on a thick brown sock she was knitting, casually said to her mother, "What is the COTC?" Well, she could hardly ask Ken. To not know such an obvious thing would only confirm what a child she was.

"I believe that is the Officer Training Corps, my fairy fay," Anne answered, looking up from a box she was sealing and smoothing her hands over her skirts. "All the best universities in Britain have them to teach young scholars how to be soldiers. Greek in the morning and gun drills in the afternoon. Have they established one at Redmond? Walter isn't thinking of that is he... Not that he could," she said, more to herself than her daughter, "he would have to have completed his B.A. or near as, before he would be considered." She stood up and sat by her daughter on the swing seat, taking possession of her knitting and counting the rows as if unable to speak without her hands being busy. "Your father wanted Jem to look into Officer training, but of course he was too impatient for that. 'By the time I had qualified the war would be done!'" Anne said, trying to laugh the way Jem would laugh, only for it to dissolve into a sigh. Oh, that this war _was_ over... Her face went paler still and she eyed the letter in Rilla's pocket. "You're not talking of Walter, are you, darling? I know you two are very tight, but if I was to find out about him enlisting because of a bill from a tailor-"

"Bills from tailors is the least of it, Mrs Doctor dear!" Susan announced, standing to attention with her broom in her hand. "I'd rather little Jem was among the many and had Jerry Meredith by his side, than be one of them Officers out by his self. They have to lead all them charges, you know, and the attrition rate does not for pleasant reading make. Have you seen them all in the 'Enterprise'? As many Capt'ns and Leff'ten'nts and Majors as there are Privates! No let little Jem stay right were he is. Them higher ranks might get better rations, but while I can always send our boys something edible I could not stop a German bullet- Wh- where is Rilla dashing off to?" she spluttered, pulling in her broom handle sharply as the girl's white skirts flustered by her and in through the green front door. "She'll never get the knack of them ankles if she's always leaving them to _you_," and gave Anne a look that meant to reprimand her equally.

"I expect she heard Jims stirring," Anne replied, not looking up from her knitting. "You know she always has half an ear out just as I did when I had the care of tiny babes."

"Perhaps it's as well I never was blessed in that department. For I know my ears are good enough, but I never heard a thing above the swish of my broom."

"You know what we mothers are like. Sometimes we just know." Anne let go her sock and rubbed at her hands, her own instincts in full cry, as she began to piece together the answer to exactly who had joined the COTC.

**_… … …_**

Owen Ford did not find out about his son's enlisting in Officer Training from a bill, however -Ken planned to pay that in cash- but from a renowned historian. One who had helped the author fill the gaps in his novels, and was about to send his only son off with the Second Regiment. Upon the Professor's third sentimental mention of 'our boys' and his third subsequent cognac, it began to dawn on Owen that Wilfred Sandhurst was not speaking in patriotic terms about Canada's youth but about their _own_ sons. A dozen cognacs could not bring back that warm, easy feeling then. Owen made his apologies and stormed home, forgetting his umbrella and his gloves, and was drenched when he came to the door, his frozen fingers unable to make the key fit the lock. He began thumping on it, and Ken, who had been rifling through the second post, waved Sadie away and answered it himself.

"Father?" he uttered, about to make some cheeky remark about forgetting keys being a sign of incipient senility. The look on his father's face, however, told him he had better hold his tongue.

"Leslie about?" Owen said gruffly, shaking down his mackintosh and tossing it over the banister. He dried his hands on his navy blazer, and smoothed down his thick brown beard that sparked with rain like flower stems in a glass of water. Ken noticed how his father's hand lingered over his mouth, and he frowned.

"No Sir," he replied, "she and Persis have gone into town to-"

"Good," his father cut in, and headed for the study. Ken stood in the hall watching him, listening out for the slam of the door. But the door did not sound, instead Owen Ford's voice called out to him, impatiently, "Well... are you coming! Or shall we stay in the hall and leave Sadie to clean up the mess?"

Ken swallowed hard and marched to the end of the house.

Owen went to his desk, more specifically to King Desk, which is what Ken and Persis called it, where he sat at his enormous chair with various awards and plaques looming on the wall behind him, and met with colleagues like Sandhurst and Tancred and others from journals and magazines. It was an ornate, lacquered piece of furniture, simply adorned with a lamp, a pen and an ashtray, and stood directly opposite the door so that those who interrupted him might have the quickest route to leave by.

The other desk -Fool Desk- was a battered, ugly thing, cowed by the weight of papers and books, and wedged under the large bay window overlooking the garden. This was where his father unravelled the story, the way a jester unravelled a long line of handkerchiefs. Sitting on a three legged stool, an old sheepskin thrown over the seat his one concession to comfort, as he drew out the words that were crammed in his head.

His father never went without a notebook, always on the look out for that phrase or detail that could begin another masterpiece or polish a work in progress. Others may have tired of feeling that their father was always an observer first and a participant second. But his son could only marvel at the way he could bring forth something rare and beautiful from the most unpromising things. All Ken could do was notice where his father had missed a word or made a grammatical error. Surely that was the real reason he had been made editor of the Varsity rag -besides the accident of being Owen Ford's son, of course.

Ken perched uncomfortably on the spindly chair put out for guests. He was about to get up and retrieve the sheepskin, preparing himself for a long lecture, when his father leaped up and began to pace the room.

"I am half afraid to speak, Kenneth. I am half afraid of words. Imagine that? Half afraid that if I say them out loud I will make this damned idea in my head come to life." He turned to look at his son and pressed his hand across his mouth. With much of his face concealed his eyes, of a steely grey, looked even more pronounced. Ken felt them to pierce straight through him and pin him to his chair. "An idea has come to me this afternoon, planted by Wilfred of all people. The irony does not escape me," Owen laughed, bitterly, "when he is the keeper of the past and this... this is very much about _your_ future." He turned back to the fireplace, gazing into the flames. "You know, of course, what I am speaking of."

"If you have been talking with Professor Sandhurst then I assume this is about the farewell dinner they had for the Officers of the Artillery Division. Sandy -ah, Jonathan is off on Saturday, departing at Kingsport with the other lucky fellows-"

"_Lucky?_ Oh, yes _very_ lucky-"

"Yes I call him lucky," Ken said stoutly. "I shall have to wait until the summer. They will have an early convocation this May, but Doctor Mead declares he won't sign off on this confounded foot for at least another two months after that."

Owen crumpled, falling to his knees on the Persian pile in front of the fire, his back to his son.

"Oh, Kenneth... Ken," he said hoarsely, "so you _have_ enlisted. I had hoped... perhaps Wilf had made a mistake-"

Ken turned and looked at his father, feeling he should go to him and yet unable to leave the chair. "Father, I am sorry. But the only one who misapprehended the situation has been you. I told you- I have been telling you for _months_ about my intentions."

"This isn't..." Owen muttered, as if he spoke to the flames and not to his son, "this isn't something you can just drop like tennis, or the clarinet, or mountaineering ...or your understanding with the Standish girl-"

"There was never any _understanding-_"

"Or any of the hundred other things you swore you wanted to do. This, this..." he voice went even softer, "I can't get you out of this."

"I don't want you to get me out," Ken declared, rising to his feet. His father turned to face him. Even on his knees he was a man to be reckoned with.

"You say that now. But what about in a year- in two or three? When your comrades are under the mud and your body has been broken, and you don't know why you're fighting anymore... _Do_ you even know? I suppose you've been taken in by all those _inspiring_ speeches they are drumming into you by the hour at that school of yours." He seized the brass poker and stabbed at the fire before leaning on it to stand up. "War mongering! Making you feel less of a man if you don't lay down your life for this notion of freedom. Tell me what freedom do you think you are fighting for when you are forced to sacrifice your life for it?"

"Nobody forced me, Father-"

"Nobody forced you? And nobody sent you that poisonous letter! Nobody sent white feathers to Guillaume and Felix and Walter! Nobody writes all that nonsense in the paper urging us all to cut back on everything except the giving of our sons." The poker was tossed aside as though it was a weapon in his hands. Ken bent down and slotted it into the coal scuttle.

"You wanted _me_ to work for the paper," he said, shortly.

Owen grasped his son hard on his shoulders, they were the exact same height, he realised. Leslie was right, Ken had taken giant strides away from boyhood since last summer.

"I wanted you to work for the paper because the world needs writers like you. People who can cut through the rot and point to the truth without fear or favour."

"I -I never knew you thought that about me," Ken murmured, half stunned. His father loosened his hands and twitted him on his chin.

"Ken, you are the first undergraduate to ever edit 'The Tatler'."

"I reasoned that was because of you-"

"_Me!_ I never liked that frivolous magazine, all that innuendo and self congratulation. But you have made it something more than that now. It has a real voice, an opinion. Though I hardly agree with most of it, I can't help admire it." Owen stood back from Ken and removed his blazer and loosened the knot of his tie. There were probably a half dozen silk ties lurking about this room -Sadie had taken to checking the potted plants. The pale blue one in Owen's hand now adorned the Iroquois False Face that glared out above the mantlepiece. Ken had always been intimidated by its mocking red look, but right at this moment he felt some sympathy for the fellow. "It was the 'Globe' that wanted you," Owen continued, drumming his fingers on the mantel, "they came to me and asked if you'd be interested in becoming a correspondent. If you had only deigned to speak to them at that party we had a New Years-"

"I thought it was your idea."

"I don't deny I wanted it -as did your mother. But if you got the job with them you would have done so on your own merits, not on my coat tails."

Ken stared at his father, heat pricked at his eyes and he blinked it away angrily. "_Why_ did you never tell me!"

"Why did you never tell _me!_" Owen demanded. He was furious with his son's decision, but behind that fury Ken saw how this devastated him. Why should it hurt him like this? Why couldn't his father be proud the way Wilfred Sandhurst was proud of Sandy, the way Gilbert Blythe was proud of Jem?

"I never hid it from you, Father. You just didn't want to see-"

Owen walked over to Fool's desk and stared at a barren garden budding with arrowheads of amethyst and gold. How well he knew every leaf and branch and how little he knew his son. It was true... it was true.

"I am good at this, you know," Ken ventured, "this soldiering business. I never expected that. I only ever wanted to do my bit. But this last month at the Training Corps... I feel as though I know what I can give now instead of taking all the time. You have that feeling, Father. Don't you want it for me?"

"Not like this," Owen pleaded. "I want you to create not destroy. To be a man of vision, not part of a machine..."

"To be like you."

"If you mean I did not raise you to become a pawn in some rich man's pageant, then yes, I raised you to be like me. To think for yourself-"

"Father, I _am_ thinking for myself."

"You are fooling yourself, Kenneth, you don't have any idea-"

"No!" Ken exclaimed, vehemently. "_You_ don't have any idea!" For a moment looked as of he would sweep the entire contents off his father's desk, before he breathed deeply and stood tall. "I don't know what lies you've been fed, or what singular idiot you met who confirmed what you already believe. But nothing you say bares any resemblance to my experience. You act as though man is bound to the cruelty within him, but there is more inside him than that! While you are holed up in here I have been spending my time among fellows with passion and vision and selflessness. I have learned more these past four weeks than I have in the past four years about comradeship and purpose!" He opened his hands and showed them to his father. "Fathers, brothers, sons, they will be looking to _me_ to lead them and protect them -I shall need them to believe in me... even when my own father doesn't."

Ken stood there waiting for his father to say something, but Owen only stared out to the garden. He put down his hands and walked to the door when he heard his father's voice -so quiet, so unlike the Owen Ford who had bellowed from this same doorway not half an hour ago.

"I have always believed in you. I just never believed you would choose this."

"You know, Father, I would like to take the credit for it but somehow I feel as though it chose me."

Incredibly, Ken found himself smiling as he spoke, and when he closed the door to the study he did not feel lost at all, but suddenly found. He was not thinking of those passionate, visionary fellows just then, or the army, or even its grand cause. But someone who walked up to him in her white summer dress with that look in her eyes that said, 'I choose _you'_.

His father's gramophone began to belt out Mahler's 'Song of the Earth' at such a volume Ken half expected the door to be blown from its hinges. If he was on the Island he could have escaped through the hedge and fallen into the long white arm of sand. Instead all he could do was look down a fiercely lit hallway to the brass tray by the door that beckoned him hourly.

He went and checked it again. No letter today. So this is what it felt like to wait. Then he must wait. He couldn't let her go now. Writing to Rilla was the one moment he could lay aside expectation and be himself. His words of war reading like the secrets of his heart. He could never share this with Walter. But Rilla must know, surely she knew, that when he wrote of map reading and rifle drills he was trying to prove his worth. To show her he had found his path. One that might very well lead to Ingleside.

He heard a key scrape in the lock and flung the door wide. His mother and sister were standing under an umbrella that Barfoot -that is, _Terrence_- was holding over their wilted hats. Apparently the rights of the working man only went so far when it came to the protection of newly coiffed hair.

"Where's Dupleix?" Persis said, shuffling past him and patting at the curls around her cheeks. "The motor's simply bursting with parcels."

"On a tie-hunt with Sadie, no doubt," Ken said, "Go get yourselves dry both of you, I'll go-"

"No! No," Persis exclaimed, "let me." She threw her father's coat over her head and dashed out into the rain.

Leslie tucked her arm tightly round her son's and nuzzled against him. "Is your father returned from the Club?" she asked.

"Mmm," Ken answered, "I wouldn't look in on him just now, he's in a Mahler mood," and lead his mother past dark strains of 'The Drinking Song of Earth's Misery' and into the kitchen where a pot of hot chocolate was perfuming the house.

They settled in the breakfast room, the cook shuffling them out of her domain using all manner of phrases she forgot were just as rude in french when one could understand french. Ken sat and watched the sleet that drove against the window pane and his thoughts walked back to Ingleside. To that cosy, dimly lit haven that was Susan Baker's kitchen. To Rilla-my-Rilla -_my_ Rilla?- to Rilla then, and her family, talking over, under and through each other at their old pine table. Leslie sat opposite him, more interested in drinking in Ken than her hot chocolate, as he watched the crocuses bend and bow under needle thin bullets of ice. Standing with an ancient knowing that what hurt them now would one day melt to nothing.

"Who are you thinking of?" his mother asked him. She could be more confronting than a faceful of sleet, that woman.

"Where Kitten has got to," Ken answered, swiftly, and took a great gulp from his cup. Persis floated in, her cheeks as red as her painted lips, her blue eyes smudged with kohl. And in her arms a brown paper parcel that she held like an infant Christ. At the sight of it Lesley stood up murmuring something about more hot chocolate and striding out of the room.

"For you I believe!" said Persis, triumphantly.

"You _believe?_"

"Well Radcliffe's said it was for you," Persis began, as Ken ripped back the paper and lifted out a khaki jacket, "but it's really not your colour-" Her voice caught, and he tore his gaze away from the uniform and saw that his sister had started to cry. "You owe me _$60_, you horrid, vain thing, and that's not even including the dress sword."

"Persis, you darling."

"Don't darling me," she snipped, trying to stem a blackened tear. "You're paying me back every tuppence, I need it for a little plan I have up my sleeve. Aren't they gorgeous by the way -these buttons are Venetian glass."

Neither were looking at the intricate mille feuille beads, but at the blazing brass ones that fell into line down Ken's new coat.

"I don't mean the money, honey," her brother said, fondly, and went to catch another dark tear as it made a path down Persis' cheek. She reached up and held his hand tightly.

"Please don't," she quivered, "You'll only make me more of a mess than I already am." Ken felt about for his handkerchief and watched her expertly erase all the sadness from her face before flinging it back at him. "I'd threaten not speak to you again but I doubt you'd see that as much of a punishment. Is that why you never told me? About -about _that?_" Persis gestured to the contents of the brown paper parcel.

"I haven't exactly told anyone," Ken said. Except Rilla. How had it come to pass that little Spider Blythe knew everything about him?

"Mother wasn't in the least surprised."

"No, I think she always knew. But I didn't tell them I'd enlisted... I kept thinking I would wait for the uniform to arrive and then-"

"Turn up for tea as First Lieutenant?" Persis scowled. "You always _did_ like to make an entrance. Well two can play at that game," and she reached up and took off her bedraggled hat.

"Persis, your hair!" Her thick blonde tresses were now cut back to little more than puffy little curls around her ears. She looked outrageous, she looked divine, she definitely did _not_ look nineteen. Ken stood back, his dark brows raised in amazement. "Father is going to-"

"Father is going to do absolutely nothing! Thanks to your fit of patriotism I could picket outside Tancreds or throw in the social season for a Boston Marriage, and Father would never notice."

A dull thud sounded suddenly and both brother and sister turned to see a small bird splayed against the glass, its feathers fanning brokenly before falling into spikes of spring bulbs. They moved to the window, staring as fat drops of grey sleet were spat upon the pane; Ken's breath, and Persis', condensing with the cold. Ken remembered their little fingers painting naughts and crosses on the fogged up windows of the House of Dreams, when the wind grew jealous of summer and blew it away with violent gusts. "Little pigs, little pigs..._"_ their father would growl from behind the bedroom door. Opening it slowly to see delicious terror in his children's eyes, before wrapping them up in his strong, warm arms and holding them fast through the storm.

"He's angry, Persis."

Persis didn't need to ask who Ken was speaking of. "Good," she said, and turned from the window and touched at her hair. "He's been too long hiding in his study, and behind that big brown beard -he looks _ancient!_"

Ken looked at her, his face all seriousness. "No. I mean he's _angry_."

"Well... he _should_ be, By God, there's plenty to be angry about. But your decision isn't one of them." She smiled again. The same thin smile as their mother, when Sadie informed her that Radcliffe's had called to say Lieutenant Ford's uniform was waiting for him. "I'm so proud of you, brother. Mostly because I know you've gone into this damned war with those dreamy grey eyes of yours wide open. I only hope that I can be as brave..." Persis said, touching her hair again.

"Well, we'll see, shall we, Kitten?" Ken said, pulling Persis to him and kissing her forehead, unable to resist teasing a finger through her short white curls. He picked up his parcel and hugged it tight. "I'll just put this lot on, then you and I will go see Father. Together."

**… … …**

_COTC is the Canadian Officers Training Corps. In this war (and previous) it was common for Officers to have their uniforms made privately and at their own expense._

_A False Face is an spiritual icon used in Iroquois healing rituals -the False face was believed to frighten, lure or trick bad spirits, bad health or bad luck into leaving._

_A Boston marriage is a term coined in Boston that refers to professional women living together as a couple rather than marrying. It became a euphemism for a same sex relationship._

_**... ... ...**  
><em>


	19. Common Ground

**Common Ground**

_In which Walter surrenders to truth; Una surrenders to feeling; and Anne surrenders to the inevitable_

_**Sunday May 8th 1915, Glen St Mary Presbyterian Church**_

John Meredith strolled down the aisle after morning service seeking out stray hymnals when he spied a lowered head in the Blythe pew. He quietly moved himself to the porch to muse over the noticeboard -'Sleepers Awake' was cancelled due to a lack of tenors- when he was blindsided by Norman Douglas. The incorrigible man had been halfway to home, when, as it often happened, he decided to march right back to church in order to clarify some point in the sermon. For the dream that lay closest to _his_ heart concerned catching out these men of the cloth, to whom the phrase 'do as I say not as I do' fairly described most of them.

Not John Meredith, however. This man meant what he said, even to the sending of his own son to the horrors of Verdun. Word was Jerry had been knocked to kingdom come last week, and lay unconscious in no man's land for hours. Yet this morning his father stood at the pulpit straight and true. Though an interrogating eye would have noticed how his black hair became more silver by the week. For all that -and the fact that Norman had married Rosemary's sister- he could not help but prod John every once and a while to check for any wobbles, spiritual or otherwise.

When he said his piece and the Minister responded to his satisfaction, Mr Douglas made his way home, but without his wife. Ellen Douglas knew that look in her husband's eye, but _she_ had a leg of mutton to get in the oven and _he_ was likely to go on for hours. Just the one passed this particular Sunday before John returned to the porch, and was tugging at the iron latch that kept the doors opened when he remembered that someone was still inside.

He walked up to him and placed a reassuring hand upon the boy's shoulder.

"Walter? I am about to go on to the Manse, you are most welcome to join me... Of course you may remain here as long as you wish."

"Thank you, Mr Meredith. If it's all the same I would like to stay," Walter said.

He had that look on his face that longed for help but didn't know how to ask for it. After this week's dreadful event John could well imagine what might be troubling the lad but he decided to make a small joke first. Knowing from experience that when one is afraid to speak sometimes a laugh could usher out the words. "You've not come to attack my sermon too, have you?" his black eyes glinting, mildly.

Walter didn't even attempt a smile. "I came here today hoping you would reveal to me why I should be _here_ and _not_ in a trench with Jem." He glanced at Mr Meredith, observing his surprise. "I know you all think I'm still unfit, but the typhoid lost its grip on me long ago. I could pass any medical, but I could never let go of this sickening sense I would be dead inside before I ever made it to battle. Until that U Boat sank the Lusitania... and all my reasons for not enlisting sank with it."

He shook his head in shame and John watched him sadly, wanting to stop the boy's bitter words, yet he let them come. "And I turned to _you_," Walter continued, "I looked up at you in that pulpit this morning wanting to hear you say one word-" his voice caught and he rubbed his eyes roughly, "just _one_, that could justify my feelings. But you couldn't. No one could. Because I'm nothing but a coward, a slacker-"

At this John could no longer hold his tongue, he reached out to Walter and grasped his hand. "And this is how you've been feeling this past year? You judge yourself more harshly than anyone else ever could."

"Why shouldn't I, it's the truth."

"Surely a coward is afraid of the truth, yet you bear it like a cross upon your shoulders."

"I _should_ bear it. Other are bearing much worse... my brother... your _son. _How can you comfort me after what happened to Jerry?" Walter wrenched his hand away and bent his head lower. "I despise myself for sitting here taking up your time," he said. "I prayed for the strength to walk out of here -I know you are weighed down by the needs of so many."

John smiled at him, tenderly. There were few in his congregation who would think twice about adding to a Minister's lot. In fact he could think of only one, his black haired daughter. While Rosemary devoted herself to fatherless households and Faith to Red Cross meetings, Una was left to cater for them all from the sketchy remains of their pantry. Her blue eyes aglow, her small mouth set determinedly, as she pored over ancient, fly-spotted recipes searching for things one could make from a sack of oats and a half cup of molasses. Faith had teased her that the worse things got the more she seemed to like it.

"You forget, my boy, that my yoke is easy and my burden is light_,_" St Matthew's words coming as naturally to John as the beat of his heart. "Don't misunderstand, this path I've chosen requires everything of me. Yet I walk it faithfully because I know it is right. The question is, Walter Blythe, what is right for you?"

"I don't -I don't know anymore," John looked at him, disbelievingly, and Walter shook his head with shame. "Before the war I knew to my fingertips what I was meant to be, who I was. But ever since that night last August I have had this feeling gnawing at me, as though I didn't know myself."

"Or could it be that only then did you truly understand who you are?" John asked him. "You have withstood a lot this year, haven't you -from without and within. Una never says a word, of course, but even I have noticed how diligently she applies herself whenever she writes to you. I would hardly call her a careless girl, but it struck me she would not make such tremendous efforts unless she knew you needed especial cheer."

Walter blushed at this discovery. He had been surprised and heartened by Una's letters during term time at Redmond. Every envelope filled with quotes from books, famous opinions, and newsy delights that made him feel, if only for a while, that the world was a brighter place. He hadn't considered what work they had been for her. "I must thank her-" he said, dully.

"You shall have you chance in a moment. Una always comes to let me know when morning tea is ready. I'm sure she thinks I'll stay here till dinner if she doesn't collect me. She is trying a new recipe -her _own_ invention. Sugarless cake! She means to test it out on me before our congregation."

"Because she knows you'll be kind, no doubt."

"I should hope that everyone counts on my kindness. I never saw the need for cruelty, even telling the truth does not excuse it -whatever certain Douglas' might avow," he chuckled. "I have always admired your gentle way, Walter, and admired the way you stayed true to it. It takes courage to be gentle just as it takes courage to fight your corner. You have done both, I recall."

"If you think you can rally me by mentioning that one little scrap I had when I was a boy, I should tell you that Rilla has already said the same."

"Lucky the man to have such angels about him," John winked. "But don't forget the girl whose life was made better by your 'little scrap'. Faith never forgot, you know. I think Jem and Jerry tried many times to teach Dan Reese a lesson. But it was when _you_ decided to fight that he knew he was done for. Remember what I told you then? To not fight until you are certain you that ought to, and then put _everything_ into it-"

"You think I have decided to _fight_?" Walter stood up abruptly and gripped the pew in front of him, worn smooth by hundreds of hands. "I can tell you I haven't, Mr Meredith. If I had I would have strutted out of this church with a bigger head than Mary Vance. But I cannot endure war, the violence, the pain-"

"You already _are_ at war," John cut in, "It's only that you have made an enemy of yourself." He stood up and placed his hand on Walter's shoulder as footsteps sounded in the porch. They glanced down the aisle to see a grave little face peering at them between long beams of light streaming through the clerestory. Walter turned away and felt John's hand press upon him. "But now I wonder if you have surrendered to the truth."

"What truth?" Walter murmured.

"That there is a part of you that _wants_ to fight." John turned toward Una and smiled at her warmly, "Hello Moonlight, is tea all ready? How did that cake come out?"

"Preserves, Father, sugarless preserves. And I think they are passable," Una replied -which meant they were certainly delicious, "But the tasting can wait if you and Walter are... That is I- I hope I didn't disturb."

"Good morning, Una," Walter said, tucking his hymnal into the slot in the back of the pew, "Don't let your tea stew on my account, Mr Meredith. You have given me a lot to think on but I must be going as well."

John took Walter's hand and shook it vigorously, "I am glad, Walter -I can't tell you how glad- to have seen you this morning."

The three of them walked out to the porch together, their footsteps crunching on the white gravel path, birdsong singing them to the gate.

"Here," Una said, producing a small basket that was hidden by her side in the folds of her dark dress, "some rhubarb preserves for your family. Susan mentioned she would like to try them. I was going to run across to Ingleside myself."

"Why don't you come with me?" Walter asked her, impulsively, "I'm sure that Susan will have a dozen questions about the making of them."

A few more exchanges followed -whether Walter was _absolutely_ sure it was alright, whether Una could _truly_ spare the time- until both faces went as red as contents of those boiled clean jars. John Meredith observed them both with a barely contained smirk, and when the two finally strolled away and he closed up the doors to the church, he allowed himself a loud guffaw. And people said _he_ was the muddler!

**… … …**

"Una," Walter said, as the two of them cut through a stand of young birches and headed to the heart of the Valley, "may I also call you Moonlight? It's such a beautiful name, I wish I'd thought of it myself."

Una swung her basket a little higher, peeping up at Walter through a glossy sweep of hair that fell over her eyebrow. "If you like. It's only a little pun, Faith used to call me Luna-Moon." She had used to call her 'Moonface' as well, but there was no strict need for Walter to know that.

"It might have started as a pun, Moonlight, but it stuck because it describes you to perfection," he said gallantly, deciding to return a measure of the cheer she had given to him in all those letters. It would prove easier than he thought. As he walked by her side through the budding meadow he began to feel as though some burden had been lifted from him. A genuine smile blooming on his lips as he began to recite-

"The half moon shows a face of plaintive sweetness/ Ready and poised to wax or wane-"

"A fire of pale desire in incompleteness/ Tending to pleasure or to pain- Oh Walter, I'm sorry. I -I always seem to be interrupting," Una stammered, self consciously, upon seeing Walter's large grey eyes go larger still.

"No, Una _I'm_ sorry... if I seem so amazed. I was half worried you'd been spending what spare time you have digging about in books and journals trying to think of something to write to me. But in poetry it seems we have discovered common ground. I never knew..."

Una clutched at the handle of her basket, the clinking glass within it stilled. "I hope I never gave the impression that I know much about it. It is only that particular poem I know so well."

Walter looked sidelong at her as they walked by the White Lady and pictured their days in the Valley. There was Jem and Jerry competing to see who could throw the most apples into Faith's apron, Carl and Shirley knee deep in the brook, Nan and Di teaching Rilla to weave garlands of cornflowers. And Una. Her eyes as blue as the crowns on his sisters' heads, peeping up from whatever book Walter was in a passion about, as she watched him recite for them all.

"Hmmm," he said, playfully, "and if I said 'A thing of beauty is a joy forever?" _  
><em>

"Its loveliness increases, it will never pass into nothingness," Una replied, steadily. "But that scarcely counts, Walter Blythe, _everyone_ knows that."

"Well, dear Moonlight, what about..." and he played his fingers over his lips pretending to mull over something, then stopped mid-stride. Una stopped, too. The jars clattered against the basket and she frowned briefly at the discordant sound breaking into the melody she found herself in; Walter's voice sounding lighter than it had all year, his eyes looked as if they might sing. "What about," he said once more, "I love you as one loves obscure things/ secretly, between the shadow and the soul/ I love you as the plant that doesn't bloom but carries..."_  
><em>

"The light of those flowers, hidden in itself_,"_ she murmured, looking at her shoes. It was for Faith he had written those words, of course it was. And yet didn't it speak exactly of her feelings for him? To have him recite them, to say aloud the words _I love you... _It was scarcely bearable. They began to walk again over lush and lucent green, it was ten or twelve strides before Una dared to look up, only to see Walter's beautiful face beaming down at her. She turned away and clutched her basket close, saying lightly, "That poem doesn't count either. That was one of yours."

"Bully of you to memorise it, all the same. I don't think there's another person I could name who could do that." Lieutenants, especially, were too busy for poetry. "Aside from Mother, of course. But then she was at the birth of so many of my poems. She misses it dreadfully, you know, writing with me."

"Yes, you mentioned something about it in your letters. You said you haven't written anything since war was declared. I am sorry about it, Walter."

"I can't seem to get beyond a few lines before it all dries up. But lately there's been a phrase -I can talk to you about this, I suppose, you being the poetry expert and all," he said, nudging against her. "But there is a phrase that has been haunting me ever since that dreadful sinking, describing a mother and child clasped together, drowning in a black abyss... Oh, Una, forgive me- I shouldn't speak to you of something so macabre."

"No, it's alright." It was a relief to know that someone else had been haunted by the same image. Una often feeling it was her own self adrift in frozen waters while a helpless body clung to her for help.

"How many people say that and how few mean it," Walter said. He spied a dandelion ballooning with downy clocks and plucked it carefully. "But _you_ mean it, don't you, Moonlight? I would like to write a poem for you one day. Of course that might annoy your sweetheart," he teased.

"No it wouldn't."

"Goodness, then he is a better fellow than most."

"N-no, you misunderstand me. I meant I don't have a sweetheart." Una blushed, letting the hair that had been tucked behind her ear fall across her eyes. If she had dared to look up in that moment she would have seen the boy walking next to her looking just as uncomfortable.

"Neither do I," Walter uttered quickly, as they passed by a chestnut tree. "Not that I want one. I don't think I would dare kiss a lass unless I was sure I was going to meet my death."

It was Una who stopped now, giving him a solemn stare. "Whatever do you mean?" she asked him, wondering if he wasn't mocking her. It was several steps before Walter realised she was far behind him. As he turned a swollen breeze undressed the dandelion and dusted Una in fluffy seeds, dotting her dress like stars.

"Well..." Walter replied, trying to sound as though he had the slightest idea what he was talking about. "If I never kissed her she'd have something to wait for, wouldn't she? But if I did kiss her... well, then she would know."

"Know what?"

"That the boy she knew was never coming back."

Una Meredith had never _not_ wanted to be kissed by Walter Blythe so much in her life. She began fussing about with the clocks clinging to her shoulder. Walter took her basket, tucking it into the crook of his arm, then looked ahead to the big scotch pine that bordered the grounds of Ingleside.

"By your logic half the Canadian army will never return," Una said, eyeing the basket and wishing she had it back.

"I don't think they will, Una. Even those that do will never come back as they were. Everyone will lose something in this war. Whether it be a limb, or a lover, or the ability to sleep without nightmares," he said, thinking of his latest letter from France -the boys sent him far more accurate accounts than any they sent to home. He remembered now it was to Jerry's little sister he was saying this to and twitted her nose, playfully. "But by all means let us kiss them all if you think it might help."

His broad shoulder brushed past the new roses on the hedge that housed the 'tennis court' -the net would not be put up again. He picked a tiny bud, more green than gold, and as Una moved ahead he tucked it into the blue ribbon that held back half her hair.

"It's nice to see you smile again," Una said, thinking of the little drawer where this rosebud would end up. Brimful with all the ordinary keepsakes he had given her over the years.

"You can take the credit for that. All your kind words to me this past year -I don't think you can imagine how much they meant. Promise me you'll always write, I should be able to face anything if I could count on that."

Una hardly hoped that anything she offered up to Walter -let alone her words- meant much to him at all. If he had said as much a year ago she was sure she would have been unable to stem a disastrous run of tears. But she too was made of sterner stuff now, and instead of choking back a sob said, almost calmly, "Of course I will. You know you can always depend upon me, Walter."

"Yes, I do. I do know that, Moonlight." She walked up to the veranda; Walter watched her black hair throw off beams of light and knew in his heart that should he ever see a half moon 'somewhere in France' he would think of this girl. "You'll come in, won't you? Susan will be drilling me all through morning tea about the making of your miraculous preserves if you don't."

All the usual protestations clamoured up inside her, because many people, not just the boy before her, depended on Una Meredith. It would be so easy to excuse herself and walk away, her heart thudding even faster than her feet. But the appealing look in his long lashed eyes, the way his hand stretched out to hers, she was nodding before she knew what she had done.

On delivery of those preserves, and the eating of it with warm scones and cups of milky tea, Walter walked out with her again. He trotted down the stone steps; the mint had begun to grow again, pale tendrils and fresh smelling leaves basking in the heat of the sun-warmed slabs. Walter turned and handed her the basket, now heavy with last of Susan's parsnip cake. Una's eyes looked straight into his, and his chin tilted in such a way that for the oddest moment she thought he would kiss her. She ducked by him quickly, muttering goodbyes, sure that a laugh was hiding inside his mouth. And when she arrived at the Manse, breathless and pink, she was equally sure that she heard it carried on the wild spring air.

**… … …**

Though Susan might sniff, on account of it letting in bees and the smell of dung from the fresh tilled fields, Anne Blythe would have the front door wide open as soon as the weather allowed it. This radiant May afternoon was no exception, it fairly sang with devotion to its aptly named day.

From up the stairs came another sweet melody as little Jims was lulled for his afternoon nap. Anne listened to it with a wondering heart. To think it might have been herself cradling a new born babe. Perhaps _two, _as Gilbert observed twins often came to older mothers, and they definitely ran in the family. Perhaps she might have struggled with their birth, perhaps she might have had to dig another tiny grave. Perhaps... perhaps... perhaps she wasn't relieved the baby she had foreseen -though the soup tureen went beyond even _her_ imaginings- was not meant for her at all. But for Rilla! It was not a burden she would wish upon any young girl and yet caring for Jims had also nourished her daughter's heart. For who could give into bitterness and dread when they sang into soft curls and breathed in the promise that was a small child.

Anne stood by the front door and looked out to the garden remembering the first steps of her children dabbling down the lawns of Ingleside. She was thinking of Joy again. Would she have run with a steady gait like Shirley or in a zigzag like Di? The lively spring breeze began to whisper the answer into her ear when she saw a white bird flutter along the veranda. Anne peered out to follow it down to where the wicker furniture had been set out again since Susan declared the weather would allow it, and saw it was not a bird at all. But a piece of paper.

It was lodged in the butterfly leaves of Susan's rheumatism plant. Anne went to retrieve the page when she saw a half dozen more being whipped from their place next to a pair of Sunday best shoes that lay underneath the swing seat. Lying on it was her son, his floppy black hair wavering in the wind, his arm cradling his head and his ankles crossed.

As he rocked in the breeze Anne was minded of the ditty Rilla had been singing, 'when the bough breaks the cradle will fall, and down will come baby...' What a strange thing to tell a child. Walter had insisted the rhyme was amended with 'straight into dear Mother's arms' -or Father's of course, for Gilbert sang to his babies as much as Anne did. She glanced at the page and saw Walter's loopy hand scrawled all over it. It seemed to be about a mother and child, floating, falling, clinging to each other. The last lines reading-

Hold my hand, oh hold it fast-

I am changing -until at last

My hand in yours no more will change,

Though yours change on. You here, I there,

So hand in hand, twinned-leaf despair

I did not know death was so strange._  
><em>

He was writing! Here were his words flowing freely, joyously. She knew it from the way the pencil flew across the page, knew the shape of his g's -though others would have only seen a loop- the way the a's and n', and the o's and u's ran into each other as though he could scarcely keep up with his thoughts. Oh, the wonder of him, the skill and the style. Anne might never know what it was to build a life from words alone, but her son would. And knowing that meant as much to her as it did to Walter -probably more. Undoubtably more. Of course she loved all her children greedily, down to the tiniest hair on their littlest toe as she used to say-

'Oh Mother,' Nan would pout, 'must you bring to mind the idea that I have hairy toes!'

'Yes, why not ears? Ears have tiny hairs you know', declared Jem.

'But ears don't decrease in size though, do they?' argued Di.

'Yeth, why not love uth to the itty bitty freckleth on our notheth?' asked Rilla.

'But I don't have any freckles,' said Shirley.

'You are one big brown freckle!' laughed Walter.

But how could she help what she felt for Walter when he was the child that answered so much inside herself? They might have flitted about over other things, but in their love of writing did their hearts and minds meet, like butterfly leaves.

She read over the poem again unable to stop herself scanning the lines for metre and rhythm. So ready -burstingly ready- to sit herself next to Walter and ask him all about it. The twinned-leaf -he would be thinking of the rheumatism plant. The hands clasping at each other as they went to they death -clearly a reference to the passengers of the Lusitania, all those mothers and children left to drown in the freezing Atlantic. But here was the mystery... one pair of hands will not not change, whilst another's will. Surely that meant only one was was going to their death while one would remain and grow old?

Only one was going to their death...

Anne dropped the page as though it was made of fire and it flew from her hands and out to the garden. She wished it might never land, that she had never read what he had written. Wishing with a raw and wounded heart that Walter was still ravaged by fever. That she had all those days to care for him before her. All those mornings to bathe his body and dress him, those afternoons to read to him, those nights listening to his tortured dreams. She would have that back, she would have that back in a second, she would have him weak and hollowed out forever before she could let him go again. Anne bent over him, breathing in the promise that was her child. Her son, her own. But not for the keeping -only for the giving. She could not do it, she could not, _she could not!_ Jem's going had already stretched her so thin. If Walter followed him what would be left of her to hold onto to-

Oh hold my hand, oh hold it fast...

Her pale fingers reached for him. How frightened she had been to feel fever burning him, parching his lips, dulling his eyes, withering his body. Now he felt so cool and supple, brimming with strength and life. She caressed his cheek shaven smooth for a Sunday, and clasped at his hand.

"Mother?" Walter murmured.

"Shhhh..." Anne whispered, knowing she said this as much to herself as her son.

"Mother, I'm writing again-"

"Yes-" she paused for a moment, struggling to control her voice. "You messy pup, there are pages all over the veranda. We shall have to catch them quick or Susan will sweep them up and feed them to the stove."

"Makes no odds to me-" and for a moment Anne thought she would hear that Walter had no care for what he had written, that he never meant it and never meant to go. "It's all in here," he said, pressing his hand, and Anne's, against his heart. "No one can take it from me now."

But they can! she wanted to cry. One small ball of iron fired from the enemy's rifle and the beauty of Walter Blythe would be lost forever. Instead she managed to say, "I'll have a listen, shall I?" and lay her ear against Walter's chest, turning away so he wouldn't see her tears.

If Walter wondered whether his mother cried he never asked, though the way he smoothed his hands along her thick, red hair told Anne that he knew. She felt like a child in his arms and remembered Matthew as every breath bore her silent plea, Don't go, don't go, don't go...

Anne did not say it. Not when he went to enlist in Charlottetown, or set off for the training camp in Kingsport, or waited for the train to take him to war. Anne never said it. Nor would she show it in her eyes, or let him feel it in the way she held him one last time. She walked home numbly, climbing the stairs without seeing them, and fell into the chair overlooking the cherry tree they planted when they first came to Ingleside. The pale blossoms that spangled the branches now lost to the wind, and she berated herself for clinging to things that cannot be made to stay.

One thing remained eternal. Her husband came to her quietly and knelt before her, pleading entry into Anne's heart. She remembered sitting at her gable window all those years ago trying to imagine a world without Gilbert Blythe. Knowing that as she tended to Walter in his illness a part of her was giving into the longing she had to have been at Gilbert's side. And here he was now at her feet, her living 'Book of Revelation'. Her love, her life, her own. Hers to keep and hold onto.

That night she stroked her daughter's long chestnut hair in the calm way her husband had, the way their son had. "Your brother can never leave you," she said, and she pressed her hand upon her daughter's heart. "He's in here. You are bound to each other."

Rilla hugged at her mother, holding her tight. Coming to know without quite understanding that the ties that bind are both tenuous and tenacious. Made from tiny rosebuds and chestnut trees, broken shells and iodine, brown sweaters and empty chairs, Albright knots and extra helpings of blueberry pie -and something more prosaic still. Made of copper, tin and lead. Running down the line that Rilla clung to, straining to hear above a bustling kitchen, a bawling baby and her own beating heart, as a voice came through the 'phone that she hadn't heard for a year.

"Hello, is that Ingleside?"

**… … …**

_fragment from 'The half moon shows a face of plaintive sweetness' by Christina Rossetti_

_fragment from 'One Hundred Love Sonnets, XVII' by Pablo Neruda_

_fragment from 'Endymion' by John Keats_

_fragment from 'The Dying Child' by Edmund Muir_

_from chapter 16, Realism and Romance, Rilla of Ingleside_

_Thank you so much for reading**  
><span>**_


	20. Lieutenant Ford gets his Come-uppance

_I want to thank you all for your reviews and follows and favourites and PMs, I never dreamed I could write something like this, but to have you care about these characters has been a dream come true for me. _

_Love and gratitude to you all, and to L.M.M. -everything is hers, only this idea is mine._

**Lieutenant Ford gets his Come-uppance**

_In which Kenneth Ford falls in love with Rilla Blythe  
><em>

**_Hollyhocks Over-Harbour, September 1915_**

Ken could hear her nervous breaths come through the receiver and hoped to God that Rilla -_and_ that blasted Mim, _and_ all those eavesdroppers on the party-line- didn't notice his own struggle to remain calm. He had never known a loveliness equal to the sound of her voice, her breath, but it was nothing to the relief he felt when he finally rang off. Long after the the conversation was over was he standing before the hall mirror staring at himself.

He had that moony look again, Mim noted, as she busied herself next to him -my goodness, but didn't the dust collect at the front door, it really needed a _thorough_ going over. Ken barely noticed the big brown hand working out an invisible bit of grime near his boots, lost in surprise at how happy he looked. Nothing like the scrabbling, desperate fool he'd felt himself to be. His grey eyes gleamed with a confidence he hadn't seen before. Not the cock-sure swagger people thought of when they heard the name Ken Ford. This was a quieter knowing.

He hadn't been always been so sure. Those scented letters that he'd left to pile up on the brass tray at Ravenscroft came to wreak their revenge, containing things that caused Ken to stop writing altogether. Well, not things exactly_. Things,_ like Daphne breaking off her engagement, Veronica leaving and Pascalle returning, Dimples Thorpe-Davis inviting him for tennis -and a rub down after- held not the slightest interest for him now. There was only _one _thing that mattered. The letter from Ethel Reese.

It had been filled with all sorts of newsy natterings from the Glen. But as Ken read it he wondered if all those tidbits weren't really there to embellish the main thrust of her letter -that Rilla Blythe was walking out with the son of the new Methodist minister. Ken had no reason to believe it was true, except that it had an unshakeable ring of truth about it. For the road to Rilla was strewn with fears that someone else would get there before him. When he saw her that night at the Lighthouse, surrounded by seeking eyes and hungry hands, the armour he wore -a bespoke, tuxedoed armour no less- revealed its first chink: Perhaps this time Ken Ford would _not_ get the girl. Instead of proving his worth what had he done but whisk her away from them all. If only he could have held her there forever.

He told himself he was glad to go back to Toronto, glad to devote himself to Officer training, glad to let her think he had forgotten her. But it was a strange sort of gladness. There was no joy in it, nothing to make him look forward to tomorrow. It wasn't until he came to Kingsport with the Third Regiment that a familiar wave went through him again. Because over the water lay the Island, and on that Island was Rilla.

He stared out across the sea with Gulf sized regret in his chest. All those chances he'd thrown away, to spend long days in her company and hold long letters in his hands. Now he would give anything for one more hour. No matter if babies and mothers and sweethearts were with her, all he wanted was to look into her eyes and see if more joy or more sorrow would be found there. When his Division was given leave Ken felt as though he'd been given wings, he could have galloped to Over-Harbour without the need of a horse -and was sure his heart beat just as loudly down the phone line. Yet when he looked at himself in the mirror he saw and he felt an unexpected peace.

He walked out the backdoor, through the hedge, to the shore that had beckoned him every day this past year; he heard it call to him whenever he was alone, felt its white arm wrap around him when he slept. His Lieutenant's cap was tossed upon a tuft of seagrass and he breathed in lungfuls of salty air before falling back into soft, yielding sand. Something fluttering and white caught his eye but he did not turn. He cradled his head in his arms and sent a smile to the heavens. Ken knew that whoever it was it wasn't Rilla. It was certainly improbable but that was by-the-by, because, well... when you know you know.

He might have wished for a little less knowing when the white dressed girl sat herself beside him. Ken looked up and saw a pretty brunette giving him her most beguiling smile.

"I hope I'm not disturbing you," she declared, and picked up Ken's cap. An Officer, well, hadn't he done well for himself!

Ken grabbed it from her and sat himself up. "Not at all- Miss?"

"Howard. Irene Howard. And I believe that _you_ are Kenneth Ford. Forgive me, _Lieutenant_ Kenneth Ford. You're a cousin to the Blythes, aren't you? Rilla Blythe is my _dearest_ friend."

Strange that Rilla had never mentioned her before. Stranger still that her dearest friend didn't know he wasn't a relation. Yet his face went hot at the implication -perhaps he was nothing more than a big brother to Rilla after all. "I'm a friend of the family, Miss Howard, here on leave-"

"Oh, does Rilla _know_ you're coming?" Irene asked, with a terribly kind concern -as if she didn't know that right at this moment that Rilla would be tearing her closet apart searching for her most flattering gown. These party-lines proved a better source of information than even Mary Vance. "The Blythes are _ever_ so busy these days. Rilla is a _mother_ now, you know," -this said as though 'mother' might be equated with 'leper'- "and so utterly devoted to her _little_ Red Cross. I don't know how she finds the time for poor Fred-"

"Yes," Ken said, brushing down his khaki trousers in a show of being about to leave, " I understand she's kept very busy with- _who?_"

"Oh yes!" Irene crowed, "I barely see her at all these days, but somehow she _always_ finds time for Fred Arnold. It just goes to show how close they are." She noted gleefully that Ken's face had gone quite white, "Rilla's _always _going on about what a poet he is, and you know how she just_ adores_ Walter. Not that Fred's even _half_ so handsome. But still- they really are _perfect_ for each other."

"I suppose they would be," Ken muttered.

"Then of course he's the same age as her, or about the same age," she continued, forgetting that Ken's age should have been an irrelevance when she wasn't supposed to know his intentions. But the girl was on a roll now and she leaned back complacently and licked her lips. "When Fred enlists in a few months time Rilla will be _crushed_. It's quite unfeeling of him really-"

"Unfeeling-"

"To get her hopes so high when he knows he'll _leave_, of course!" Irene explained. She sidled closer to that strong, khaki clad arm, its Officer insignia blazing upon it handsomely. "_Nothing_ but the _deepest_ love could persuade me to risk my heart like that. I just know I would _never_ recover."

"Then you had better not risk it, Miss Howard," Ken said, stiffly, and stood up.

Irene put out her white gloved hand in order to be helped to her feet. Though Ken Ford's response hadn't been quite what she had counted on, if he was going to invite her for a stroll she wasn't about to decline. She needed a ride back to the Glen come to that -after Olive _would _quarrel over which of them should be the one to track down the dashing soldier. Clearly _she_ should have precedence when Olive was mad on that farm boy from the other side of Mason's Pond. Actually, now Irene came to think of it if Ken didn't come to her aid she would have to shuffle back to Upper Glen in this awkward hobble skirt!

Miss Howard was to curse both Olive, the Army, and the entire fashion industry as Ken bade a curt farewell. He was due back at Hollyhocks, would not have use of the buggy that evening, and wished her a pleasant stroll home.

He slunk in through the back door and into his chair. Though Martin and Frankie never saw it -Lieutenants never had black moods, surely, the Army wouldn't allow it- Mim felt the change in him immediately. Little Ken had as little appetite as the last time he sat at their table. She would not waste her creamed peas on him _this_ time, at least, and asked if perhaps he wasn't up to a visit to Ingleside after all.

"I can't just sit here," Ken replied, absently, and then remembered himself, taking in the care and expense the Wests had gone to to give him this farewell meal. "What I mean is I must enjoy in this beauty while I may. You know, Mim," he said, "while I am very fond our little House of Dreams, the more I come to Hollyhocks the more I love this side of the harbour."

Mim reached over and held his hand. Blessed boy! He was such a sweet, thoughtful lad now. Though she didn't half miss the rogue who had come to them last year. Francis never saw the like of all those stamps! When Ken had bowled through the door of Hollyhocks last night -'Yer usin' the front door, I see', Mim winked. _'_The quicker to get back to you!_'_ Ken laughed- he had such a smile on his face. That happiness was short lived. Usually the sandbar could revive him when nothing else would, but he had come back so quiet. Was there nothing that might cheer him? Mim decided she would try, starting with _that_ call to Ingleside.

"There are a great many draws to th' Glen, to be sure. Young Rilla Blythe fer one. When that wee angel took on the Anderson child -well it near made a Presbeeterian of me."

"There's a new Methodist minister, I hear," Ken said, poking at his potatoes.

"Well, an' it looks like the last laugh is on us-" Martin chortled, as he helped himself to another chop, "We Methodists thought that Mr Meredith as woolly headed as they come. Then along comes this Mr Arnold, as mild as a lamb when we was countin' on a lion-"

"Tush, Martin West! D'yer want our lad repeating that from here to Four Winds?" Mim admonished, gesturing to their son with the carrot that was fixed to her fork.

"Don' think much of their boy, either," Frankie added. "Leas' before we had some bully stories at Sunday school. Daniel and Samson and Noah and David..." he said, longingly, savouring the blood and carnage of those Old Testament favourites. "But Mr Arnold has had us studyin' the Sermon on the Mount for weeks! Blessed are the _meek!_"

"Now, now, Francis, Fred Arnold is a good lad. You'll miss him, no doubt, when he goes off to the Front."

"Wish _I_ could go off to the Front," the boy said, eyeing Ken's cap on the sideboard. "This summer was dull as dull."

Ken smiled at him, fondly, remembering how only a year ago that he had wished the same thing. If he had his chance again... forgetting that Rilla was only fifteen then and spent most of the summer hating him. Now she was older and probably wise to the likes of cads like him. If Rilla loved this Arnold boy he could hardly blame her.

He walked along the red dirt road that evening not as quickly as he once imagined he would. The long shadow cast by the setting sun made him feel as though Fred Arnold walked beside him. But on arriving at the gate he looked over the prospect with a military eye and liked what he saw. For as much as any poet would have admired the way the glossy leaved trees reflected the rising moon and flickered like a forest of stars, or the lilies that fringed the drive seemed to beckon him into the house, what Ken saw was surely as promising.

The house wasn't lit from every window which meant there should only be a few people at home. This was corroborated by three sets of fresh footprints and the tracks of a horse and buggy leading to the gate, and none except his own heading toward the house. Better and better, Ken thought, concluding that perhaps only Miss Oliver, and Shirley, of course, might be lurking about. And he credited both with a horror of playing the gooseberry.

He walked up to Ingleside with a happier heart than the one that had walked out of Hollyhocks. If only it hadn't lodged in his throat when he saw Rilla Blythe coming to meet him on the veranda. He nearly broke the other ankle coming up the stone steps. Thick drifts of mint grew all over them and he snagged his boot momentarily. The look on Rilla's face, so surprised, and the tone as she greeted him, so hesitant, Ken wondered if perhaps she wasn't waiting for someone else after all. She was certainly dressed as though she was expecting someone important to her. Ken brushed his hands down his khaki jacket, self-consciously, feeling for the first time that his well cut uniform wasn't rather commonplace when he compared himself to the vision before him. She was breathtaking, shining with a beauty both radiant and mysterious. A little candle aglow in the dark; Ken longing to touch her yet somehow afraid.

He walked down the length of the veranda. Two wicker chairs had been pulled close together and he knew then that no one else would be joining them. They were surrounded by towers of blooms, from purest white to a lusty scarlet, though what Ken noticed was the smell of the sea. He breathed it in remembering the last time they were alone, remembering the push and pull of the tide -and in himself. That pull was even stronger now, Rilla had grown so much in his absence it was easy to forget how young she still was.

"This is better luck than I hoped for," said Ken, leaning back in his chair and looking at her with very unconcealed admiration. "I was sure someone would be hanging about and it was just you I wanted to see, Rilla-my-Rilla."

He had not intended to call her that again, it was Walter's name not his. But he forgot everything as she sat by him in her organdie gown. To think there may have been many evenings, many hours, he could have spent with her, instead of just this one. It hurt all the more when he saw the look on Rilla's face. Her large hazel eyes aglow on hearing that little name, and then as if remembering her brother, she said, "There aren't- so many of us- to poke around as there used to be."

"No, that's so," said Ken, gently. "Jem and Walter and the girls away- it makes a big blank, doesn't it?" Walter's absence had already left its mark on Ken, what must it be like for his sister? Of course Rilla would long for people like her brother. People like Fred Arnold, perhaps. Ken leaned forward until his dark curls almost brushed her hair. He had to know, before he said another word, whether he was the only one she wore that dress for.

Rilla was about to answer when a wail filled the air, angry lungfuls of unhappiness slicing them apart. Ken drew back in bewilderment before realising this must be the baby, this was Rilla's little boy! This laughing, lighthearted girl of last summer, what sort of mother did she make?

A brief look passed over Rilla's face that hinted at things unlawful before she gave Ken an apologetic smile, explaining that Jims had probably had a nightmare. She left Ken on the veranda, wondering as she climbed the stairs why her entire family had to choose _this_ night to abandon her, then someone else could have silenced the brat. That was until she saw the forlorn look on the little boy's face and knew hers were the only arms that he cried for. Ken stood leaning over the banister watching moonshadow dance on the lawn. He heard crickets sing and then Rilla's voice from the open window humming the tune to the Hesitation Waltz. His hands tightened as he heard it, remembering the feel of Rilla in his arms. Her hair had brushed against his lips, her breast pressed into his own, and all he could do was to count out the beat lest he lead her into the harbour.

She was even taller now. He would have felt her lashes flutter over his jaw, would have felt the way her waist began to flare out, how even more of her pressed into his chest. Perhaps when she returned -the humming had stopped, the baby must have finally fallen back to sleep- he would ask to play a tune on the gramophone. He might take her in his arms, he might waltz her about the dimly lit sitting room, he might...

Her footsteps sounded on the stairs and it struck him now that Rilla had never answered his question. He returned to his chair determined to know but on sight of her he changed his mind. The reason that baby had become so quiet was because the little lad was still in Rilla's arms. She sat down by Ken, cradling Jims, with the sweetest look of embarrassment on her face. For this little cupid had no thought of bringing two lovers together, but of meddling to such vexing degrees Rilla began to wish soup tureens had never been invented.

Jims, however, was a picture of happiness, dimpled, golden and nuzzling into Rilla's creamy throat. He did not look like some scrappy foundling but a child who had had come to trust in this young girl's devotion. Ken could not think of any young woman in his acquaintance who could have done what this sixteen year old girl had done. Persis would have hired a nanny, Daphne would have left the poor brat to cry. Yet here was Rilla in her sweet white dress, a length of pearls in her chestnut hair, a posy of roses at her waist; looking for all the world as though she was expecting an evening with her best young man, and she had given it away in a moment for this war baby.

The vision of maternal devotion was slightly marred by Rilla's expression, but it did not linger long. It was at this moment that Jims Anderson decided to speak, gazing into the girl's face and saying his first ever word- "Will-Will."

Ken might have been invisible at that moment and he leaned back in his chair gazing raptly, as Rilla bestowed the baby boy with tender kisses, holding him tightly against her breast with an uninhibited, undisguised love. She had no thought for Ken, no care for how he might perceive her. There was nothing calculating about Rilla Blythe. She was her own dear self -light and dark, cross one moment, adoring the next. So beautiful to Ken, so courageous and true, that whatever strong fancy he once felt seemed an empty, selfish offering compared to his feelings now.

Jims' eyes closed as Rilla held him, and Ken thought of the painting in his mother's study, of the Madonna and Child. He had stared up at that beloved image ever since he was a little boy. Even at such young an age he knew that what he looked at, what he felt, was _love_. Love that lived inside him and would also light his way. That tide came in now, such a swell of feeling he had never known. Pulled by the need to be there for Rilla... to protect her... to fight for her. To_ love_ her. _He loved her -_couldn't speak nor move for the love he had for her.

Rilla knew nothing of this and lay Jims down in the sitting room as Ken sat in silence. He couldn't talk, knowing if he tried words would tumble from his mouth like a wave, so that Rilla could not help but draw back. This was a feeling unnavigable, wild, wondrous. He almost wanted to laugh. He did laugh, to himself at least, as Susan Baker came stomping up the steps.

There was more laughter to come, painful rolls that he kept inside for the sake of the girl next to him. Her face in agony as Susan rambled on -_and on-_ about the naughty children Rilla and Ken had once been. The debonair, sophisticated idea of himself was laid to rest that evening. The way Susan showed him for the ridiculous child that he was; the way Rilla looked as if she wished the floor would open up and swallow her. How he wanted to take her freckled little face in his hands and tell her none of that mattered now. He was as much a little fool as she was, and he was glad she knew.

Ken stood up abruptly, those feelings threatening to engulf him, and he walked to the end of the veranda. As he went down the stone steps, turning to see if Rilla would follow, he found himself face to face with her. How different she looked. He recalled the way she would lower her lashes over her eyes whenever he went near her -of course she would with him looming over her. But now they stood together. Heart to heart, eye to eye ...those fire coloured _eyes_ -of light and dark, joy and sorrow- speaking of all the longing he felt inside himself.

"Rilla," he said in a sudden, intense whisper, "you are the sweetest thing."

Her hazel eyes burned with a vivid gold. Her cheek once so pale flushed hotly, he was so close he felt the heat of her skin and there was nothing else. No baby waiting for Rilla, no war waiting for Ken. Just a light in the dark; just the two of them.

His mouth pressed urgently against hers. Lingering on that kissable little dent on her top lip, so ripely soft -so this is what it felt like -the thought had taunted him for more than a year. Yet to touch her now, feel her breathe mingle with his own, it was as if he had never kissed a girl before. And as he drew back he knew he never wanted to kiss another girl again.

There was no question of her loving anyone else, the moment he kissed her he knew. He felt it in the way her gasp gave way to excitement, the way her body moved into his how much she wanted to return that kiss. But the world would intrude. In the shadows lay Susan and Jims, over the water lay war. Everything laid claim on them -everything but time. The was no time left. This kiss must last them as long as they must be parted, and their sweet, foolish hearts believed that it might be enough. Ken did not seek another kiss, but something more important. He sought a promise.

"Rilla-my-Rilla," Ken said, "will you promise me that you won't let anyone else kiss you until I come back?"

He saw the answer in her eyes before one word was uttered. Not for her the games, the tears, or the planting of doubt. She loved him wholly, the love struck boy and the brave Lieutenant who let her go and said goodbye.

He had to push himself away now, every step he took hurting more than any broken bone. But Rilla could not ignore the feelings inside her. She stood on the steps trying to catch her breath before realising she never would. Something new and wonderful had lodged inside her breast, and she would never breathe easily until the day she saw Ken walking toward her again.

His steps soon joined all the others who had walked away from Ingleside. He looked up at a glowing moon and remembered that stroll on the sand, wanting nothing more than to grab her now and whisk her away. Yet he kept walking. Listening out above the chirrup of insects and the beats of his heart for any sign that Rilla was still with him. He knew she would have gone. Gone into the house, to her baby, her work and her woes. She had gone from him -yet still he listened.

As the road rounded a corner he stopped. Something inside Ken wanted to make her a promise of his own; that he would return to her. He _would_ return. He would walk down this path and back to her door if he turned now and saw her. Of course, he knew she wouldn't be there, but all at once her being there was all that came between him and annihilation. If he saw her there at this bend in the road he would come back to her. If he turned now and she was there he would live.

He brought his face to his shoulder, felt the wool of his khaki uniform graze against his jaw. If she was there... if she waited for him... if she was watching him leave... If she stood here at this bend in the road-

Ken turned abruptly. And saw her standing amid the tall white lilies by the gate. He waved his hand -she waved hers- he was gone around the turn.

**… … …**

_Some sentences taken directly from chapter 16, Realism and Romance, Rilla of Ingleside. I hope I have managed to place them without it feeling too obvious a change in style. As always let me know if anything needs tweaking. I am writing a story about Anne at Redmond next and imagine I will begin the sequel to this story before Christmas._

_Thank you all so much for reading, I hoped you enjoyed it :o)**  
><strong>_


End file.
